The decision to not hold any exams was taken after months of online protests by students and deliberations and meetings between stakeholders including education ministers and secretaries of states as well as high profile ministers such as I&B minister Prakash Javadekar and Union Defence minister Rajnath Singh.

Finally, the board on June 1 cancelled the examinations for CBSE students following a high-level meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The announcement made by Modi stated, “Health and safety of our students are of utmost importance and there would be no compromise on this aspect". He added, “Anxiety among students, parents, and teachers, which must be put to an end."

The next step will be to declare the result. While the union government has said that CBSE will release a “well-defined objective criteria” to declare the result in a time-bound manner.  

Reports suggest that the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is working on two options for marking class 12 students. While first option is to assess the students on the basis of their performances in Classes 10, 11 final exams and Class 12 internal exams and the other option is to give weightage to Class 10 board exam results, and internal assessments in Class 12. 

In their official statements both CBSE and CISCE have said that they will declare the criteria which will be similar to that of class 10. The boards also said that students who will be unsatisfied with the results but students will get another chance to appear for written exams when the situation improves. 

The CBSE will file its reply to the Supreme Court tomorrow, June 3. The court is hearing two petitions on the issue of Class 12 board exams. CBSE’s decision to cancel Class 12 board exams came two days ahead of the top court’s next hearing on the matter. 

The center on Monday informed the Supreme Court that the government will take a final decision within the next two days on whether to conduct Class 12 board exams amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.