I scored a 49 in my CBSE Board exam in English. When I demanded the answer sheet, it said 50. They don’t even upload marks right. CBSE is a scam. I later got an admission in English(H) in a top DU college based on my writing skills. Was the top few of the class. CBSE=SCAM.

Thirteen years ago, they wouldn’t re-check your paper. They’d only re-count the marks. So I won’t to the Delhi High Court. Was told they can’t do anything because they can’t go over the SC’s decision, the judge basically apologised to us 11 kids and said “woops” bad luck

It was the first heartbreak of my LIFE. I cried a whole month atleast, so much sometimes I couldn’t breathe. That was the one subject I was never worried about. I was always always good at it. Later, I saw my answer sheet when I asked for it.

All essays, opinion questions I was given huge zeroes on. ZERO. On essays. The guy who corrected my paper also corrected a few others from my school, giving all of us marks in the range of 40-60. English score matters, it used to be a required subject in your “top 4”

For any bachelors degree in DU, they’d take those grades into consideration. For me personally, I wanted to take up English Hons. LOL. Even though all my other grades were 90+, I was left TORN.

So I wrote an essay in 10 minutes in an Extra Curricular Activity Quota trial at @GargiCollege and left the room, hoping for nothing. Later got a call that I got into the course I wanted to. I was the top few of my graduating class.

To this day, I feel indignant. There’s nothing more heartbreaking than to have someone hand you random grades that make no sense after a whole year of studying. Specially in the one subject you always ACED. If you know, before CBSE English exams—

Teachers tell you “write simple English, they don’t understand hard vocabulary”—- yep, they ask you to dumb down your answers as much as you can go score high. That’s our education system. Learning literature in school isn’t analysis, it’s “what did Mary say to Tom?” It’s a joke

So what I want to say is. I don’t know if grades matter in life. I don’t know if marks define your fate. BUT PLEASE. Do NOT base your worth on CBSE BOARDS. They’re a SCAM. A lie. It feels like it is everything, I promise you, there’s a life beyond where nobody cares about it.

+ Please don’t compare your grades to those of others around you. I remeber boys in my class who couldn’t speak a grammatically correct sentence scoring a 97 in English while I sat there crying with a 49. I cannot say this loudly enough: please don’t let these grades get to you.

Oh I forgot. A friend couldn’t attempt questions worth 15 marks, ran out of time. Scored a 95 on the subject. YOU SEE HOW IT IS ALL A LIE?