In first year of pass-fail policy in Delhi schools, 20 per cent of Class 8 students held back

Under Section 16 of the original RTE Act passed in 2009, schools were prohibited from detaining or expelling any student up to Class 8 – a policy that many blamed for poor learning levels and high failure rates in Class 9, the first level at which children could be detained for failing to clear their exams. In 2019, following demands from at least 18 state governments, Parliament amended the law, allowing state governments to take a call on whether schools can hold back a child in Class 5 or Class 8 if she fails in the re-examination.

In 2019, the Delhi government constituted a committee to take a decision on the no-detention policy. With the committee ruling in favour of scrapping the policy, the Delhi government brought back the pass/fail system in its schools at two levels – in Class 5 and 8 – starting from the 2023-24 academic session.

The Department of Education’s RTI response shows that the failure rates are much higher in Class 9 and 11. In Class 9, around 36 per cent students had to be held back after failing to clear their exams even after a remedial or compartment exam. In Class 11, the failure rate – after the compartment exam – stood at 24%. Last year, before the compartment exams were held, around 39% of students had failed in Class 9. Around 30% of Class 11 students failed before the compartment exams. For this year, the RTI response did not disclose failure rates before the compartment exams.

The Delhi government did not respond to questions sent on the failure rates since the scrapping of the no-detention policy.

A member of the Delhi government committee who was not in favour of scrapping the no-detention policy said, “The pass-fail system expects children, including those coming from poor and disadvantaged sections, to take responsibility for their learning at the age of 10 or 11…that if you do not perform, you will fail. The child is being punished when everyone else – the administration as a whole, the teacher, the principal, the entire ecosystem which creates the curriculum and syllabus – is responsible.” Saying the no-detention policy was meant to stem dropouts, the member said, “It’s possible that we will see more dropouts now. Parents may not be able to afford another year of education, particularly in the case of girls…they may be sent back to their villages or married off.”

Another member of the committee, however, said the scrapping of the no-detention policy was “rooted in good rationale”. The member said, “The passing criteria in these exams are liberal and included marks for attendance etc. It was not a mechanical process that only relied on marks in the exams.”

According to the Delhi government’s assessment guidelines for Classes 3 to 8, students are required to secure at least 33 per cent marks in each subject and at least 25% marks in the mid-term and annual exams. Students are given up to 5 marks for attendance, 5 for subject enrichment, 5 for project-based activities, 5 for portfolio of co-curricular activities, 5 for multiple assessments, 5 for unit tests, 20 for mid-term exams, and 50 for annual exams – adding to a total of 100 marks on which the students are assessed in each subject.

The DoE declared the results of the re-examination on May 10.

In 2022, when the Delhi government issued the assessment guidelines, then Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia had said, “Through these (guidelines), our aim is not to stop any student from getting promoted to the next class, because a child never fails, it is the system that fails… our real aim is to bring the same degree of seriousness in elementary grades as for Class 10 and 12. The ‘no-detention policy’ was very progressive but due to lack of preparation, the education system could not take full advantage of it.”