Hyderabad: The Congress on Tuesday claimed that the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government was circulating a "tampered and fake report" to hush up the role played by Globarena Technologies and Telangana State Board of Intermediate Education (TSBIE) in the discrepancies in the evaluation of intermediate exams.
AICC spokesperson Sravan Dasoju alleged that Education Minister Jagadish Reddy, Principal Secretary Janardhan Reddy and TSBIE Secretary Dr Ashok were directly responsible for the entire goof-up, adding that the three persons must be punished.
Addressing a press conference along with TPCC Working President Ponnam Prabhakar and Chevella MP Konda Vishweshwar Reddy, here at the AICC Headquarters, Sravan claimed, "The three-member committee, headed by Telangana State Technology Services (TSTS) Managing Director Venkateshwar Rao, has submitted a comprehensive report of 110 pages. All pages of the report were signed by the Committee members. The report has exposed several flaws in the valuation process and also made several recommendations."
However, Sravan said only a 10-page unsigned report was circulated in media circles to hush up the original findings of the committee. This report was presented by the same people who should be accused of large scale discrepancies in the results, he claimed.
Accusing the TRS government of playing with the lives of lakhs of students, Sravan alleged that students and their parents were still being misled by Jagadish Reddy and TSBIE officials. He then demanded that the original report be placed in the public domain immediately.
The AICC spokesperson said that the three-member Committee had recommended revaluation and recounting under the supervision of an independent agency.
Sravan claimed that no action has been taken against the Globarena Technologies whose crime has been clearly established in the probe conducted by the three-member committee. Instead, efforts are being made by the government to shield the private firm, he added.
He disclosed that the TSBIE has awarded a contract worth crores of rupees to Globarena Technologies without even having a legal agreement. "This was clearly disclosed in the report submitted by the committee. But the TRS government appears to be in no mood to take action against either the Board officials or Globerana Technologies," he said.
The Congress leader also accused Jagadish Reddy of misleading people with wrong statistics of revaluation and re-counting (RV/RC) done last year.
In an interview given to a newspaper on April 26, Reddy had claimed that of 24,690 applications received last year, the mark sheets of only 796 candidates were changed.
Calling this claim a "blatant lie", Sravan said that as per the information secured by one Vinod Kumar Gupta of Shahinayatgunj in Hyderabad from the TSBIE through an RTI application, a total of 20,465 candidates had applied for RV/RC in IPE March 2018 and another 5,192 for IPASE May 2018 and the marks of 6,419 candidates were changed.
He said the statistics furnished by the TSBIE itself show discrepancies in the mark sheets of more than 25 per cent students. "However, the minister is trying to downplay the reality by furnishing fake figures," said Sravan.
Over three lakh students reportedly failed in the intermediate exams conducted by the Board of Intermediate Education (BIE) in the state. This led to protests by students and parents alleging large-scale discrepancies in the examination process.
According to reports, nearly 20 students have committed suicide across Telangana after failing in the intermediate exams.
