Students appearing for the Bihar Board‘s Class 10 and 12 examinations will no longer have the word “Fail” printed on their marksheets. The state Education Department plans to replace the term with “Kaushal ke liye patra” “(eligible for skills),” the Indian Express reported today. The change, the government said, is intended to ensure that a poor examination result does not undermine a child’s confidence.
Education Minister Mithilesh Tiwari announced the proposed change at a review meeting on Thursday night (August 27), saying the relevant rules would be amended and directions issued to the Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB) for implementation.
Tiwari said a student’s inability to secure the expected marks in an examination should not be seen as a reflection of their talent. He said it was therefore necessary to maintain children’s morale, and words such as “Fail” would no longer appear on their certificates.
What exactly is changing?
The change is narrower than a change in the pass-fail system itself.
The government has not announced any alteration in the marks required to pass BSEB examinations or in the existing classification of successful candidates into First, Second and Third divisions. A student who does not meet the required standard will not automatically be treated as having passed simply because the word “Fail” disappears from the marksheet.
What changes, at least for now, is the language used on the official document—not the underlying examination result.
Special classes for supplementary exams
The Education Department also plans to conduct special classes for students appearing in the Matric supplementary examination. The classes will run for a month, giving students additional preparation and, the government hopes, a better chance of clearing their papers.
Why the word ‘Fail’ has particular significance in Bihar
The decision comes against the backdrop of Bihar’s long and often difficult relationship with board examination results. The BSEB conducts examinations involving millions of students, and a poor result can affect college admissions, family expectations and future employment opportunities.
The board has also faced intense scrutiny over the years. The 2016 Intermediate topper scandal, in which an arts-stream topper struggled to answer basic questions about her own subjects during a television interview, exposed serious problems in Bihar’s examination and affiliation system and triggered investigations.
During the Covid-19 disruption, the BSEB took an extraordinary step to prevent students from losing an academic year. In August 2020, then state Education Minister Krishnandan Prasad Verma announced that 2,14,287 students who had failed in one or two subjects in Class 10 and Class 12 would be given grace marks as a one-time exception, since holding compartmental examinations during the pandemic could have delayed their admissions.
That episode showed how an examination result can carry consequences well beyond the examination hall. The latest decision applies a similar underlying idea in a different way: the government is not eliminating the distinction between students who qualify and those who do not, but it is changing the language attached to those who fall short.
What remains unclear
The announcement is a policy decision rather than, so far, a formally notified change in BSEB examination regulations. The Education Department still needs to amend the relevant rules and issue directions to the board.
It is also not yet clear whether “Kaushal ke liye patra” will simply replace “Fail” on marksheets or whether it will eventually be linked to an actual skill-development pathway for students who do not clear the examination.
For now, Bihar’s message is more limited but still significant: failing an examination may continue to affect a student’s result, but the government no longer wants the word “Fail” to define that student on an official certificate.