BATHINDA: Hearing a matter regarding a student being denied entry at an examination hall, the Punjab and Haryana high court on Wednesday directed the Bathinda district education officer (secondary) to produce the CCTV footage of the hall gate at St Xavier Senior Secondary School of March 2.Taking up the petition of Deepanshu Bansal of Mansa, the court has also issued a notice to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) for March 25.In his petition, Deepanshu has claimed that he had reached the hall at 10.03am to appear for English examination that was to start at 10.30am, but he was not allowed to enter the hall by the centre superintendent at the school, affiliated with the CBSE.He said thus, he lost a full year of his educational career, as he was to seek admission in an MBBS course on the basis of NEET result. He has said even if he appears in the compartment examination this year to clear English paper, he would be late as the counselling would be over by the time the result will be out.Deepanshu, through his counsel Hari Chand Arora, had enclosed copies of guidelines for centre superintendents. As per guidelines, candidates should be advised to be in their seats 30 minutes before the scheduled commencement of the examination, but no candidate is to be allowed inside the examination centre after the commencement of the examination.Two more students were also stopped from appearing in the examination that day.With parents of those students taking up the matter with the Bathinda deputy commissioner, the latter deputed the DEO (secondary) to resolve the dispute. The deputy DEO (primary) even reached the school, but could not resolve the matter.Even as the tehsildar, appointed by the DC as duty magistrate, visited the school, the centre superintendent did not open the gate of examination hall. The duty magistrate then called the area SHO who got the hall gate opened with the help of police officials, but by then the examination time was over. The DEO procured the footage of CCTV cameras installed at the gate of examination hall.Counsel Hari Chand Arora said the petitioner has prayed for direction to CBSE for conducting special English paper for him or to pay a compensation of Rs 10 lakh for wasting a valuable year of his educational career. He has also demanded that CBSE be directed to disaffiliate St Xavier Senior Secondary School over the misconduct of school principal-cum-centre superintendent. Bathinda DEO (secondary) Baljit Kumar said, “We had conducted an inquiry into the matter and procured the CCTV footage. I have got telephonic information about court order and we will provide the CCTV footage to the court before March 25.”

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