Shri Rahul Gandhi during an interaction with CBSE board students

New Delhi: For the CBSE On-Screen Marking (OSM) system, Leader of Opposition Shri Rahul Gandhi took a potshot against the government, announcing his meeting with a group of students who have been targeted as “anti-nationals” and “deep state agents” online. In a video shared on X, the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha shared his interaction with the students and demanded a bright and secure future for them.

In the post on X, the Leader of Opposition Shri Rahul Gandhi had demanded an independent judicial probe into the OSM and wrote, “Vedant and his friends are brilliant, brave young Indians who asked CBSE and the Modi government simple questions — but got insults instead of answers,” while also describing the interaction as “revealing chat with my fellow ‘anti-national Soros agents’.” One of the students, Shri Vedant of Class 12, had alleged in a post on X that the Physics answer sheet uploaded by the CBSE under the revaluation process was not his and the post went viral on social media. Shri Vedant’s post prompted other students to raise similar issue and CBSE later reached out to them and shared their correct answer sheets. The students narrated their ordeal to Shri Rahul Gandhi and the 55-year-old joked about how they were labelled “Pakistanis” and “deep state agents” after raising what he called legitimate concerns and issues.

“You are students. You are asking for your answer sheets, that’s all. Now, suddenly, you have become anti-nationals. You have to accept the problem if you have to solve the problem. You are refusing to accept the problem and blaming the poor kids and saying ‘you are deep state, you are spies, terrorists’,” Leader of Opposition Shri Rahul Gandhi says in the video, “Were you also called terrorists? Tell me!” Gandhi asks Vedant, his brother and other students in the 90-second clip. In the middle of the interaction, Shri Rahul jokingly tells the cameraperson: “Bhaiyya, show the faces of these ‘terrorists’!”

Last week, Leader of Opposition Shri Rahul Gandhi had alleged that the CBSE chose a company that “had already pulled off the same deed in Telangana in 2019” under a different name for the on-screen evaluation. “The company Coempt (Edu Teck), which was handed this responsibility (on-screen marking), had already pulled off the same deed in Telangana in 2019 under the name Globarena. Name changed — but the intent the same, the nature the same. Everyone knew the history, yet the contract was still awarded… This isn’t a mistake—it’s a deliberate conspiracy,” Shri Rahul Gandhi wrote on X.

Leader of Opposition Shri Rahul Gandhi questioned why the contract was given to the company Coempt, “on whose orders”, “which rules were bypassed to award this contract”, “why weren’t background checks done”, and “what is the connection between Coempt’s management and the (Narendra) Modi government”.

OSM row: The CBSE introduced the OSM system for Class 12 exams for this year’s examination of over 98 lakh answer books and as per the system, answer sheets were scanned and later marked digitally on a portal by evaluators. The contract was awarded to Coempt Edu Teck, Hyderabad.