A major technical glitch delayed the start of the summer examinations of the Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University (YCMOU) on Wednesday, disrupting the morning session across several of its 558 centres after servers failed to deliver question papers on time.
System Malfunction Causes Confusion
The university's digital delivery system, designed to securely transmit question papers to centres shortly before exams, malfunctioned during the morning session, leaving centres unable to download the papers. This prompted confusion among thousands of students who were waiting inside examination halls.
University Switches to Backup Plan
Confirming the issue, Controller of Examinations BP Patil said, “Technical glitch did occur at the time of giving question papers for the students in the morning session. We then switched to Plan-B, in which we emailed the question papers to the registered email IDs of the respective centres.”
The breakdown left students waiting well past the scheduled start time. “The exam was scheduled from 10.30am. However, around 10.45am we were told to wait. We were finally given the question paper at 11.15am,” a candidate at a Nashik centre said.
Incorrect Question Paper Distributed at Some Centres
Compounding the disruption, some centres briefly distributed an incorrect 2024 question paper set before the error was detected and rectified by university staff. Patil said affected students were compensated with additional time to ensure fairness.
Afternoon Session Proceeds Smoothly
University officials later confirmed that the technical issues were resolved by the afternoon, and the second session proceeded without disruption using the primary secure system.
Digital Delivery Model to Continue
Despite the incident, YCMOU maintained that the digital question paper delivery model remains robust and will continue to be used for the ongoing summer examination cycle, scheduled to conclude on June 7.
