KARACHI – The Board of Secondary Education Karachi (BSEK) has officially postponed the annual matriculation examinations for three days due to severe administrative lapses and technical failures. Originally scheduled to begin on April 7, the exams will now commence on April 10, 2026, under a revised schedule.
Technical Glitches and Admit Card Crisis
The decision comes as a relief to over 350,000 students who were left in a state of limbo. Despite the exams being less than 24 hours away, thousands of students had not received their admit cards. The BSEK’s online portal remained largely dysfunctional, preventing private and government school administrations from downloading the necessary documents. Schools reported receiving constant error messages while attempting to access the portal. Furthermore, those who managed to access the system found the admit cards to be incomplete or missing for a large number of students. This technical failure left students unaware of their assigned examination centers, causing widespread panic just before the papers.
Official Stance
A spokesperson for the BSEK stated that the postponement was made in the “best interest of the students.” The board had previously directed school heads to collect physical admit cards from the BSEK conference hall if the portal failed, but the sheer volume of missing cards made this task nearly impossible to complete in time.
Underlying Administrative Turmoil
The crisis is being linked to internal friction within the board. Examination affairs reportedly came to a standstill following the removal of former Controller of Examinations, Zia-ul-Haq, on March 16. A new controller from the Larkana Board was only appointed four days before the scheduled start of the exams, leading to a race against time that the board eventually lost.
Reaction from School Associations
The Grand Alliance of Private Schools Associations had earlier demanded a week-long delay to fix the “shambolic” arrangements. Haider Ali, a leader of the association, stated that conducting exams in such chaos is a joke with education. He emphasized that the future of 350,000 children should not be sacrificed for anyone’s personal ego or internal board politics. While the board has only granted a three-day extension, it remains to be seen if the BSEK can resolve the technical portal issues and distribute all pending admit cards by the new deadline of April 10.
