The CBSE board exams 2021 were cancelled for Class 10 and postponed for Class 12 on April 14. The move came after over 30 lakh students waited on the official announcement regarding the CBSE board exams amidst a staggering rise in Covid-19 cases the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic.
Amidst the students who called for a cancellation of the CBSE board exams was a 15-year-old Siya Tayal who wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi raising the various concerns from students, parents, and teachers. She highlighted how staying alive was more important than board exam marks.
Her social media campaign tagging Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the open letter on April 13 was supported by students from all over India. She wrote that “in the larger scheme of life, board examination has little value. They are a means to an end and not an end itself.”She also mentioned in her letter to the PM that the Covid-19 vaccines had not been tested for children under 16 and noted that “Multiple number of positive cases have come up even after the 1st and 2nd vaccine dose. I request you sir to cancel board exams across the country in 2021 so that when we students go back to school, none of us are missing.”
15-year-old Siya has also spoken at UN, Geneva and she is a youth Ambassador under UNITAR and Global Challenges Forum initiative. She has won ‘The India Volunteer Award’, ‘Pramerica Bronze Award’, and has been nominated for Kurt Han Prize 2020. Among the initiatives, she has taken are the Bee Nifty, ‘a 100% non-profit initiative’ that provides income and livelihood to women in rural Haryana by making recyclable bags. She is also the youth speaker for the Internet Governance Forum for an event of UNDP.
