Bhubaneswar: With just a few hours left for the annual High School Certificate (HSC) Examination of the Board of Secondary Education (BSE) to begin tomorrow, elaborate arrangements have been made for its smooth conduct.

As many as 6,08,031 students would appear for the matriculation (HSC) examination to be held at 2,818 examination centres across Odisha.

Candidates have been asked to report at these centres at 8 am tomorrow for the MIL paper. Candidates will be provided with Optical mark recognition or Optical Mark Reader (OMR) sheets at 8.15 am.

At 8.45 am candidates would be provided with question paper attached with answer booklet.

Candidates will be given 15 minutes to go through the questions and examination would begin at 9 am sharp.

In order to prevent copying and malpractices by candidates, three-tier squads have been constituted.

At the District Education Officer (DEO) level 58 flying squads and 37 central squads have been formed.

Teachers have been also included in these squads.

“In total 6,08,031 candidates are appearing the for the exam. Question papers have already reached at 302 different nodal centres,” informed Minister for Schools and Mass Education Badri Narayan Patra.

“Question papers and other materials for the first three examinations have already reached all the 302 nodal centres,” said Jahanara Begum, president BSE.

Question papers have been dispatched to most of the examination centres from the nodal centres amid tight security. However, question papers would be dispatched to some examination centres tomorrow in the morning. Strong rooms in which question papers have been stored are under 24-hr vigil.

While the examination is scheduled to conclude on March 8, special attention has been paid for its glitch free conduct in Maoist affected areas of the State.