Title - Error in hall ticket causes confusion

A printing mistake on hall tickets brought candidates appearing for a Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) exam to a wrong venue in Selaiyur, Tambaram, on Sunday morning.Angry over not finding their roll numbers and allotted classrooms, they staged a protest and squatted on the road outside the venue. The test was cancelled and a re-examination will be held in two months, an official said.A national two-hour, objective-type written test was conducted on Sunday by RRB.The test was conducted across 37 venues in Chennai, including Bharath Engineering College (Bharath University) in Selaiyur. Only 2,304 candidates were to appear for the entrance test here, but an additional 1,000 plus students landed up.After the candidates were informed that they had come to the wrong venue, they protested at the venue. Some of them also damaged furniture.They then gathered on Agaram Then Main Road, blocking traffic for nearly an hour.Though policemen tried to pacify them, the agitated candidates said they would disperse only after an assurance from RRB authorities.

Sunitha Vedantham, Chairman, RRB, Chennai, said a re-examination would be conducted within two months for the 3,000 candidates who came to the Selaiyur venue on Sunday.

Ms. Vedantham said 19,272 candidates were to appear in 37 venues in Chennai. The proceedings were peaceful in the 36 other centres.

Problems arose because of a printing error in the hall tickets of candidates who were to write the tests either at General Cariappa Higher Secondary School in Saligramam or Annai Velankanni Matriculation Higher Secondary School in Saidapet.

The results of the tests held in 36 other centres would not be released until the re-examination was conducted for the 3,000 odd candidates who had missed their test.

Candidates were of the view that as several thousand young men and a considerable number of women too appeared for the test, it was an irrational and unwise move to make them come to Chennai from as far as Coimbatore, Kanyakumari, Tuticorin, Tirunelveli and other remote locations.