The Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) has allocated 15 different centres to conduct tests on Saturday to select students for scholarships provided by private schools. The KMC has said the exam will start at 11am and the students can take admit cards online, starting on Thursday.

Recently, after the Secondary Education Examination (SEE) result was out on June 7, the KMC had asked all private schools to give at least 15 days to students to submit their applications for scholarships from the date of publication of the SEE result.

The reason, the KMC said, was to facilitate those students who come from far-flung areas of the country.

Only the students who passed the SEE from community schools are eligible to apply for the scholarships and the exams are going to be held in community schools under CCTV surveillance, say officials.

According to KMC officials, a total of 6,017 applications have registered for the scholarship exams; of which, 4,144 have applied for science faculty, followed by 1,484 for management faculty. Meanwhile, 245 applications have been filed for technical subjects and the remaining for the humanaties stream.

“The KMC is ready to conduct a fair exam on Saturday in 15 different schools,” said Nabin Man Manandhar, the KMC spokesperson. “We are committed to making the process fair and very transparent.”

The KMC in its notice had asked SEE graduates to apply for scholarships in private schools that lie within the KMC area. It had announced an online form for scholarships that the interested students were supposed to fill up between July 13 and July 28.

There are 504 private schools and 89 community schools in the metropolis.

In the first week of June, the KMC published the names of 342 private schools within the metropolis that failed to provide details of scholarships they have given to students up to Grade 10.

Many schools rushed to provide their scholarship details. By June 20, 465 had submitted the details, and the KMC estimates that around 1,300 students will benefit from it.

Sita Ram Koirala, education officer at the Education Department of KMC, said the exam will be monitored through CCTVs.

Koirala said students will be asked multiple choice questions (MCQs), and KMC will be using the Optical Mark Recognition (OMR system) to check the answer sheets. There will be no negative marking.

“Then, we will be allocating a quota for students from poor backgrounds, those living with disability and for members of the oppressed groups,” Koirala had previously told the Post about two weeks ago.

Although the KMC's new drive to bring reform in the education system has been appreciated from all corners, Nepal Guardians' Federation is sceptical about the process being fair and inclusive.

“This is a good initiative by KMC, but we are in a wait and see mode to ensure that only the deserving students get the scholarships,” said Suprabhat Bhandari, chair of the federation.

He said he hopes it doesn’t turn out to be yet another social media stunt. “Good execution matters,” Bhandari said.