Class 10 certificates to include parents’ names from this year

Water-proof marksheets to be issued

13/03/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,CHENNAI

K.A. Sengottaiyan

From this year class 10 students’ public exam marksheets will include the names of the parents, School Education Minister K.A. Sengottaiyan announced in the Assembly on Thursday.

The Minister said the decision was based on an order from the Chief Minister. The government has also allocated ₹13.50 crore to develop water- and tear-proof mark sheets. Teachers say the decision could check the use of fake certificates for jobs.

The government earlier experimented with digitising Secondary School Leaving Certificates. Later, the Directorate of Public Instruction introduced a password system for Chief Educational Officers to verify the genuinty of uploaded certificates. “We suggest that the government issue the certificate as a smart card just like PAN, driving licence or the ration card,” he said.

Earlier in the debate on demands for school education, Congress MLA S. Vijayadharani wanted the government to dispense with the practice of using teachers for other purposes. She urged the government to upgrade school infrastructure so that teachers would stay in villages instead of commuting long distance.

Mr. Sengottaiyan said teachers deployed for work such as data collection for census were paid for the job. The government had built homes for teachers in the villages, but teachers sent their children to private schools elsewhere and hence chose to live farther from their workplace, he said.