KARACHI, May 16: Some 27 students were caught cheating during day one of the annual higher secondary school certificate examinations conducted by the Board of Intermediate Education, Karachi (BIEK) on Thursday.

At the 165 exam centres, the papers held in the morning were those of Urdu, History and Sindhi for second year while the second half was reserved for first-year students taking their English papers. Most of the cheaters were caught while taking their Part-I English normal and advanced papers in the afternoon.

“The cases, with all the cheaters being boys, have been referred to the Unfair Means Committee, who will deal with each student individually and according to the enormity of his crime,” said BIEK Chairman Anwar Ahmed Zai while speaking to Dawn on Thursday.

“Some may see their papers cancelled, while some may be suspended, etc. The punishment for impersonation is suspension for two years though no one was caught impersonating as a candidate today,” he said.

The chairman along with examinations controller Mohammad Imran Khan Chishti, director general (colleges) Dr Nasir Ansar, additional commissioner Rubina Asif, deputy commissioner (central) Dr Asifur Rehman and magistrates had also paid surprise visits to colleges during the day.

People out early on Thursday may have passed by several boys and girls standing in line outside the various examination centres that were holding the board papers. Some parents, especially mothers, waited outside classrooms and examination halls during the entire three-hour exams.

“Last year I wasn’t allowed to enter the college and had to wait outside on a footpath while my son took his Part-I paper here but things are better and calmer this time despite the absence of Rangers here. Some professors were also too harsh on the examinees, yelling and screaming at them unnecessarily, but I’ve heard that they have been transferred out now,” said Mrs Rais, who was waiting for her son solving his Part-II Urdu paper at Jinnah Government College in North Nazimabad.

There were 550 students taking their exams at the college in the morning. Inside many students had their mobile phones with them but lying on their desks on the side with the batteries taken out.

“With the way the security situation is in the city these days, we can’t really expect the students to be without mobile phones but we tell them to switch off the phones and take out the batteries as we can easily spot anyone putting a phone back together again that way,” said Sheikh Jalaluddin Saadi, associate professor of Botany at the Jinnah college.

Meanwhile, some 1,000 girls were taking their paper at the nearby Abdullah College. Prof Parveen Siddiqui, the invigilator in one of the classrooms, said she had only asked the girls to switch off their phones. “I haven’t asked them to take out their batteries also, because I think just switching off the phone should be enough. We also don’t take away the phones for the duration of the examination as then there is a lot of confusion while returning the phones to the real owners as some may get mixed up while others go missing,” she said.

At 11am, the ceiling fans in the classrooms slowed down and stopped as the lights, too, went out. “Well, everyday at this time we experience two hours of power loadshedding here and the KESC may not make an exception during the exams,” she commented as the candidates started perspiring.

“We didn’t even get to study well for our exams due to the loadshedding, and now we have to take the exams, too, in this heat,” mumbled a girl sitting on a corner desk while shaking her head.

On the vast grounds outside, the many mothers waiting for their daughters also had some complaints, but with the college management. “See, we are sitting on the grass here because the benches are all just too dirty. Someone should have thought about cleaning or dusting them as they know that many mothers accompany their daughters on exam day,” said one mother.

Another said that she and her daughter had to change three buses to reach the exam centre. “The centres are assigned keeping in view the distance from the students’ own colleges but this centre is still a long distance from our home,” she said.

One student, Shazia Aslam, complained about the new flyover right next to the college. “Maybe they could bring in some road barriers or blocks to slow down the vehicles speeding by the college gates. We all have to cross the main road to reach here. There is an accident just waiting to happen here,” she forewarned.