EXAM FEVER

  Hyderabad: Students are increasingly seeking help and information from the helpline of Telangana State Board of Intermediate Education (TSBIE). As against very few calls in February, the helpline now receives around 500 calls a day.

The helpline was launched in 2017 after a series of suicides were committed by distressed students taking intermediate exams. In 2018, between January and February ahead of the exams, as many as five students had committed suicides and in 2019 there has been one suicide case reported by an intermediate student over exam stress.

“Most of the calls pertain to general enquiries which include information about hall-tickets, exam centers, fees and so on. We have all the information needed online but since everyone is not familiar that way, people choose to use the helpline. We even receive calls from concerned parents,” said B Krupakar Reddy, PRO, TSBIE.

Apart from the general quires about the exams, the helpline also offers counseling to distressed students. The official added, “Although, those kinds of calls are few in number, we do try to address all the concerns of students and being distressed is one of those, we try to give the necessary counseling and see to it that the student is in a better position. If the student is in a bad mental situation, we suggest him/her to appear for backlog exams. At the end, nothing is more important than student’s health.” 

There are several other private counseling centers in the city who offer help to students in various ways. Srinivas Yepuri, a career counselor of Amaze Career Guidance, says “We get many indirect cases where the mental health of the student is at risk. In that case, parents are to be blamed. Pressure and mental torture regarding grades and ranks result in students taking unhealthy steps. Education is an important part but it shouldn’t be prioritized health.”

“We first try to analyse if the student has any external pressures. In most cases parents force them into taking a course they’re not interested in and they expect the students to score well. and we also encourage them to take up a hobby rather than studying all the time and make them understand that the situation is not that serious and can be controlled efficiently by the students themselves,” adds Srinivas.