The Education Ministry is going down the drain. The impact of the Central Board of Secondary Education’s debacle in the Class 12 results are now striking the highest echelons of the education system. This week millions of students had a problem with the garbled marks and frozen payment screens. Parents were furious. The department was literally cooked from the inside out. Now, it seems that the Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan is about to concede defeat
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The heat began when the new On-Screen Marking system was introduced. It was to be a giant step in technology. To save time and prevent physical tampering, the answer sheets were scanned and the time was spent grading on the computer. Rather, the servers literally exploded in flames. This caused a panic among 17 lakh students, which was serious enough. But the political fallout is turning out to be much worse.
A Sudden Shift in Tone
Initially, Pradhan attempted to control the bleeding. He entered the CBSE building earlier this week and claimed 100% moral and legal responsibility for the mess. He faced the camera and expressed his apology to the students. He recruited some heavyweight techies from the IITs to correct the code. He guaranteed that none would be left behind. It was a textbook crisis management play. He prayed to God of article 75. That particular constitutional provision ensures that a minister must be held 100% responsible by Parliament for the activities of his/her department.
He took the beating. He protected the officials. However, there has been a significant change in the past 48 hours. Taking the blame is one thing. Resisting the backlash from within the party is another one.Another one is surviving the backlash from the inside of the party
The Philox gets the inside scoop
Rumors began to spread late on Thursday night. The sources from the close circle that spoke only to The Philox had a different story to tell about what was going on behind the closed doors in New Delhi. That wasn’t enough for the public apology to end the story.
These sources said that Pradhan has been actively preparing his resignation letter. It is not only from the opposition parties who are angry. The actual challenge is within the camp. Senior party strategists are looking at the calendar. This massive administrative failure looks bad right now as it nears the next legislative session and they are very concerned about it. National exam fails in the heart of the family. It corrupts public confidence in a manner that is quite rare for political scandals. According to Philox sources, the minister is feeling cornered. He feels that a complete exit is the only alternative to ensure that the opposition does not take the entire government down with the dam sinking ship of CBSE.
A Documentary Series on the digital collapse and the future of the media
The only way to find out why a Cabinet minister could resign is to look at the magnitude of the failure. The board had to handle about 40 crore individual sheets of students’ responses. They outsourced a huge part of this digital infrastructure. The code was just not ready to load.
Students were presented with very inaccurate marks when the system choked. Later, when desperate teens sought the chance to re-evaluate, the banking gateways timed out. Everything went wrong. There were 17-year-olds crying over failure. You had parents yelling at bank tellers about being unable to access their money in a digital void. A patch job for the IT is underway. The big banks are pushing their systems directly into the board’s portal to prevent transaction timeouts and the like. But it’s too late. The trust is gone. A server reboot can’t fix angered voters.
Essentially, due to opposition pressure.
It was only a matter of time before political opponents recognized the blood in the water. Rahul Gandhi was not to be deterred. He took to social media and described the entire CBSE digital rollout as a big scam. He raised allegations against the private tech companies in Telangana. He called for an independent judicial investigation and a Special Investigation Team.
The opposition is working to squeeze this as much as they can. They are connecting to the failures of the past with regard to electronic voting machines and other digital projects related to the CBSE. They’re painting a picture of a government that loves flashy technology, but can’t run it. Pradhan tried to fight back. He stated that the charges of scam were “desperate” and “baseless”. He believes the procurement process was adhered to. But it doesn’t fix the broken answer sheets by yelling at the opposition. The noise just kept getting louder and it appears that the minister knew that he was an unusually big political problem.
The Weight of Command and Article 75.
This returns the concept of ministerial responsibility right into view. Article 75 is more than a courteous rule. It is the foundation of the parliamentary system. The face of the department is the minister. The minister bears the responsibility for any errors made by the clerks.
Typically, a scapegoat is sought by politicians. They have a low-level director. They suspend a couple of engineers. Pradhan didn’t. When he made his public claim to full ownership earlier in the week, he had pretty much cornered himself. That ended with him. So he had nowhere to turn when the internal party pressure grew. This is the hardline stance on the constitutional obligation that is fueling his departure now, according to the sources speaking to The Philox. He can’t take credit Monday and then turn down the job when trouble strikes Friday.
How Do the Students Fare?
The worst thing that can happen is for a minister to resign in the middle of a crisis. The class 12 students are awaiting. College Admission Clocks are running.
