New Delhi: The Lok Sabha on Tuesday (February 6) cleared the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Bill, 2024, which goals to forestall unfair means in public examinations and customary entrance checks held throughout the nation. The invoice seeks to deal sternly with malpractices and irregularities in authorities recruitment examinations, with provisions for a most jail time period of 10 years and a positive as much as Rs 1 crore.
The Bill will now be tabled within the Rajya Sabha and, when cleared, introduced to President Droupadi Murmu for her assent earlier than it turns into regulation.
‘Law to safeguard curiosity of meritorious college students’
Piloting the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Bill, 2024, Union Minister Jitendra Singh mentioned the proposed regulation is supposed to safeguard the curiosity of meritorious college students and candidates.
The Lower House handed the Bill after rejecting some amendments proposed by opposition members.
The Bill was launched within the Lok Sabha on Monday (February 5). The proposed regulation is just not meant to focus on the scholars however will act towards organised gangs, mafia parts and people indulging in malpractices and won’t even spare authorities officers present in collusion with them.
Here are the important thing factors of the Bill:
- The Bill proposes a high-level nationwide technical committee on public examinations that can make suggestions to make the computerised examination course of safer.
- The committee will lay down the protocols for insulating digital platforms, devising methods and means for growing foolproof IT safety methods, making certain digital surveillance of examination centres and formulating nationwide requirements and providers for each IT and bodily infrastructure to be deployed for the conduct of such examinations.
- The Bill seeks to discourage the nefarious parts from being concerned in malpractices to deploy solver gangs, or use impersonation strategies and bask in paper leaks.
- The Bill goals to convey to the fore better transparency, equity and credibility to the general public examination methods, whereas additionally reassuring the youth that their arduous work and real and honest efforts is not going to go in useless and will likely be rewarded, and their future is protected.
- Creation of faux web site to cheat or for financial achieve, conduct of faux examination, issuance of faux admit playing cards or provide letters to cheat or for financial achieve and manipulation in seating preparations, allocation of dates and shifts for the candidates to facilitate adopting unfair means in examinations are additionally among the many offences punishable below the proposed regulation.
- “Any person or persons resorting to unfair means and offences under this Act shall be punished with imprisonment for a term not less than three years but which may extend to five years and with fine up to ten lakh rupees,” the invoice learn.
- A service supplier, engaged by the general public examination authority for conduct of examinations, shall even be liable to be punished with imposition of a positive as much as Rs 1 crore “and proportionate cost of examination shall also be recovered” from it, in line with the invoice’s provisions.
- Such service suppliers shall even be barred from being assigned with any duty for the conduct of any public examination for a interval of 4 years, it says.
- The invoice covers recruitment examinations carried out by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), Staff Selection Commission (SSC), Railway Recruitment Boards (RRBs), Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) and National Testing Agency (NTA) amongst others.
