Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today wrote to Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, Union Human Resource Development Minister, urging the latter to reconsider CBSE’s decision of hiking examination fee for Class-X and Class-XII students.

"You may be aware that the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), Ministry of HRD, has recently caused a sharp hike in the examination fees of Class-X and Class-XII students causing resentment among parents and other stakeholders. The abnormal rise, specifically of the fees in respect of SC & ST students by 24 times has come as a shock," the CM wrote in the letter.

"You may know that Odisha Government has opened more than 200 English Medium Model Schools affiliated to CBSE in rural areas for the benefit of economically and socially underprivileged sections of the society. This decision is bound to result in acute hardship to them," Patnaik mentioned.

He requested the Union Minister to prevail upon CBSE to reconsider the decision in the interest of people.

Notably, examination fee for Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) students under the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has been increased from Rs 50 to Rs 1,200.

Similarly, general category students who were paying Rs 750 for five subjects earlier will now pay Rs 1,500.

All India Parents Association’s Odisha chapter members had earlier sought Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s intervention in this matter.