Anam, a 16-year-old student at the state-run Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya in Khajoori Khas, Delhi, found herself in a spot as she stared blankly at her academic career suddenly brought to a halt by her school.

Earlier this year, during her Class IX annual examinations, she was battling typhoid, which led to her failing the tests. This setback, however, wasn’t the first. Previously, she had flunked the annual examination of the same class because of family issues.

Anam’s father works as a mason and the family’s circumstances have posed additional hurdles in her academic journey. Now that she has failed twice, the Delhi government wants her to shift to the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS), an open school board, to continue her studies.

“I am not interested in shifting to NIOS. I understand I have to spend a lot of money by purchasing materials and other things. My father cannot support me. I want to continue in this school. But the head of the school is asking me to shift. Please help me. I assure you I will do well this year and in the Class X board examination next year,” Anam told The Telegraph.

Like Anam, over 17,000 students of Class IX who have failed twice in the same class are being “forced” by school authorities to shift to NIOS, in a move decried by academics and parents.

They said the Delhi government has been following this practice for the last seven years to secure a high pass rate for its students in the board exams conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).

In Delhi, the government schools are affiliated to the CBSE. Pushing out the low-scoring students from the schools helps it achieve better results, they said. They questioned the Delhi government’s claim of offering the “best education”.

The education department (DoE) on Tuesday issued a letter to the heads of all its schools to ask unsuccessful students to leave and take admission in NIOS.

The letter said: “As per the data received from computer cell (DoE), 17,308 students have been declared unsuccessful in Class IX for the second time during the 2023-24 session. It is observed that only 6,200 students are in the process of enrolment through the NIOS portal of the DoE till date.”

“As per our ongoing efforts to reduce the drop-out rate among students, it has been observed that the students who have failed twice are at the risk of discontinuing their education. These students need immediate attention and support so that they do not drop out,” it added.

The letter said that accordingly, all heads of government schools are directed to provide proper counselling to these students and their parents to ensure that they get registered with the NIOS school project of the DoE.

“The initiative aims to give them an opportunity to continue their education at their own pace and in the subjects of their own choice so that they can be mainstreamed into their parent school once they pass Class X,” it added.

Anam’s guardian Zahid, however, said that the school’s head teacher was forcing her to shift. “They are saying they will not allow the student to continue. They are forcing her to leave,” he said.

Former NIOS chairman professor C.B. Sharma disapproved of the Delhi government’s practice of handing over unsuccessful students to NIOS. He said the Delhi government started the practice in 2017 when he was NIOS chairman. Sharma said he was opposed to the idea.

“This is like pushing the children out of the school by the government itself. Instead of helping and supporting the lagging children, who are from less-privileged classes, the government handed them over to NIOS to take care of them. This is unfortunate,” Sharma said.

Ashok Agrawal, a member of the court of Delhi University and a lawyer fighting cases of education denial to poor students, has issued a legal notice to the DoE to allow students to continue their studies in the same schools. “The Delhi government is blaming the students entirely for the poor results. There are many other deficiencies which it does not want to rectify. It wants to penalise the poor children,” Agrawal said.

He said the schools had engaged contract teachers, they do not have proper labs and science teachers, and there was no special care for the lagging students.

An email has been sent to DoE secretary Ashok Kumar to understand the government’s perspective on pushing the lagging students out of school when they need more support. His response is awaited.