Ahmedabad: Over 200 students of St Xavier’s College were barred from taking their semester examinations due to attendance shortfall, triggering protests on the campus. The college administration enforced its attendance policy during the final exams for the second, fourth and sixth semesters, which began on Saturday.According to college rules, students must maintain at least 75% attendance to be eligible for exams. Although the college recently relaxed this requirement to 65% in response to concerns, around 200 to 250 students still failed to meet the revised criteria and were not permitted to take the exams. Initially, about 600 students were at risk of missing their exams under the 75% attendance rule.The situation led to large gatherings of students and parents at the college, where they voiced their dissatisfaction with the decision. Many argued that the attendance requirement should be further reduced to 50%, citing genuine difficulties faced by students. Parents highlighted issues such as long commuting hours, especially for those travelling by bus, traffic delays and personal challenges that affected regular attendance.The college had issued hall tickets before the exams, clearly stating that students would be allowed to appear for only the subjects for which they met the attendance requirement. As a result, some students were unable to take exams in all their subjects, leading to further frustration.However, the college management maintained that students had been repeatedly informed about attendance requirements throughout the academic year. Warnings were reportedly issued twice, once during term exams and again before the prelims. Officials stated that despite these reminders, some students did not take attendance seriously, and a few also held part-time jobs.The administration clarified that affected students would not lose an academic year but would be promoted, with pending subjects treated as backlogs to be cleared later.
