Lokhande Prashant Sitaram appointed CBSE chairman, Varun Bhardwaj takes charge as secretary

The Centre on Tuesday appointed senior bureaucrats Lokhande Prashant Sitaram and Varun Bhardwaj as the new Chairperson and Secretary of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), respectively, following the transfer of the incumbent officials amid the controversy surrounding the board's On-Screen Marking (OSM) system.

Sitaram, a 2001-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the AGMUT cadre, currently serves as Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs.

According to a Personnel Ministry order, the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC), headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved his appointment as CBSE Chairperson, replacing Rahul Singh.

Singh has been posted as Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.

The ACC also approved the premature repatriation of CBSE Secretary Himanshu Gupta, a 2012-batch IAS officer, to his parent cadre, the Ministry of Home Affairs, on "administrative grounds" with the condition of "extended cooling off".

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According to the order, Gupta will be eligible for central deputation again only after December 12, 2030.

Varun Bhardwaj, a 2008-batch Indian Information Service officer and currently Director in the Ministry of Education, has been appointed as the new CBSE Secretary in place of Gupta.

The appointments came hours after Singh and Gupta were moved out of the board amid allegations of irregularities in the digital evaluation process for Class 12 examinations.

The CBSE has been facing scrutiny after several Class 12 students alleged that the scanned copies of their answer sheets uploaded by the board did not match their handwriting, raising concerns about possible answer-sheet mismatches under the OSM system.

The controversy has sparked concerns among students and parents regarding the implementation of the digital evaluation mechanism.

The board has also faced criticism over reported technical glitches, payment failures, and delays in the verification and re-evaluation process, leading to demands for greater transparency and accountability.

With inputs from agencies