In a case of large-scale cheating, the Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Board (GSHSEB) officials recently found that as many as 959 class XII general stream students had been involved in mass copying.

According to The Times of India, the students wrote the exact same answers for the same questions, in the same sequence, and even made the same mistakes.

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The incident took place in spite of the strict measures that have been put in place to check cheating. The results of these 959 students have now been withheld till 2020, and they have been failed in the subjects in which they are suspected to have cheated.


The incident came to light after board authorities combed through the answer sheets of exam centres from where complaints were reported. These centres were mainly in Junagadh and Gir-Somnath districts. At one of these centres, 200 students wrote an essay titled ‘Dikri Ghar Ni Divdi (daughter is earthen lamp of the family)’ in the exact same way from start to end.

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The subjects in which mass copying took place included Accounting, Economics, English Literature, and Statistics.

Some students told the investigating committee that they were dictated answers by the teachers at the exam centres. 

Sources also said that many of the students had enrolled as external students, but paid Rs. 35,000 to be shown as ‘regular’ students despite attending school for barely 2 weeks. 


 This is the single largest instance of mass copying in the history of the GSHSEB.