The Madhya Pradesh and the State Education Board has stoked a controversy after it committed a huge blunder by replacing the word ‘gambling’ with the word ‘Gandhiji’ in class 10 preparatory exam paper.
According to the reports, the embarrassing error appeared in a 45-minute model test paper to prepare weak students before they appear for the final exams.
In reply to a question on what were the qualities of ‘subuddhi’ (righteous man) and ‘kubuddhi’ (immoral man), the answer read “kubuddhi was a wicked man and led a life of drinking and Gandhiji”, instead of ‘drinking and gambling’.
Many people have raised serious questions on the editing standards of papers. Following the outrage, the Congress-led state government ordered a probe into the “printing mistake” which cropped up in the test paper.
Madhya Pradesh Education minister Prabhuram Choudhury took cognisance of the matter and said that the department will act against the responsible person. ‘We will look into the matter and take strict action against the person responsible for this”.
Commissioner of Directorate of Public Relations, Jaishree Kiyawat said that the mistake was not intentional but it was a typing error and the proofreader of the test-paper has been issued a notice for the same. “The paper was for remedial classes held for weaker students to help them prepare for the boards. We take such mistakes very seriously and have also issued a correction for the same,” said the officer.
This is not the first time that the Madhya Pradesh State Education Board (MPSEB) has committed such mistakes. As per a report in Times Of India, In the General Hindi textbook of Class 12, the death year of India’s Missile Man and former president APJ Abdul Kalam was printed as 1915 instead of 2015. The books for class 12 were distributed in July this year.
Similarly, the English textbook of class 8 also mentions the date of birth of Kalpana Chawala March 17, 1962, instead of July 1, 1961.
Recently, a controversy had erupted over a similar issue after an official booklet of the Odisha government had described the death of MK Gandhi as an “accident” triggering a massive controversy in the state last month.
The two-page booklet titled “Aama Bapuji: Eka Jhalaka” (Our Bapuji: A Glimpse) was published on the occasion of 150th birth anniversary of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. The booklet presents a brief account of his teachings, works and links with Odisha. However, the booklet also states that MK Gandhi “died due to accidental reasons in a sudden sequence of events on January 30, 1948, at Delhi’s Birla House”.
