Expert team from IITs formed to help CBSE in portal issues

THe amerind Institutes of Technology (IIT) Kanpur and IIT Madras feature deputed a four-member expert team up to facilitate the exchange Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) resolve glitches in its post-result services portal, with the team set to conduct a full technical audit to identify whether the disruptions were caused by software flaws, system overload or possible external interference or cyberattacks, directors of both institutes said on Monday.The development comes a day after Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s directive to both the premier institutes to examine technical issues reported since the rollout of this year’s post-examination re-evaluation services and assist the Board in ensuring a glitch-free process.The team, comprising two experts each from IIT Kanpur and IIT Madras, will audit the portal’s technical systems and workflows.“The team comprises computer systems, process and cyber security experts. They will conduct a full audit of CBSE’s re-evaluation portal to identify possible causes behind the glitches and suggest corrective measures,” IIT Kanpur director Manindra Agrawal told HT.IIT Madras director V Kamakoti said the team would carry out a root-cause analysis of payment-related glitches, login and access failures, server-side issues, software architecture and overall system performance.“The team will examine whether the disruptions were caused by internal software issues, server-side stress or external interference, and recommend corrective measures to make the portal stable and reliable,” he said.Kamakoti said it would be “premature” to conclude whether cyberattacks or other external disruptions were involved.“The audit will first establish the exact technical cause behind the failures before any conclusion is drawn. The experts will review how the software is functioning, identify weak points in the system and suggest improvements to prevent similar disruptions,” he said.In a statement on Sunday, the education ministry said the experts would review portal stability, server performance and overall IT infrastructure robustness, besides examining login authentication, user access systems and payment gateways.The intervention follows complaints from students and parents over technical issues in the re-evaluation process after Class 12 results were declared on May 13. The Board’s overall pass percentage fell to 85.20%, down from 88.39% last year — the lowest since 2019. This year marked the first full-scale rollout of CBSE’s On-Screen Marking (OSM) system, under which 9.86 million answer books were digitally evaluated, while 13,583 were checked manually after repeated scanning failures.