The Day CBSE Blamed Women for Everything

In December 2021, millions of 15-year-olds opened their CBSE Class 10 English board exam only to discover a reading comprehension passage straight out of the Victorian era.

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On Saturday, 11 December 2021, Class 10 students across India sat down for their CBSE Term-1 English Language and Literature examination.

As they flipped to Section A (Reading Comprehension), they expected a text about global warming, social media habits, or perhaps a cheerful narrative about a trek in the Himalayas.

Instead, they were presented with a philosophical essay claiming that the decline of civilisation was directly caused by wives who refuse to listen to their husbands.

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The Passage

The comprehension passage solemnly informed fifteen-year-old students:

"What happened was that the emancipation of the wife destroyed the parent’s authority over the children... It was only by accepting her husband’s sway that she could gain obedience from the young."

The text went on to argue that children were becoming unruly and disrespectful because modern women worked outside the home instead of staying in their lane.

To make matters even more surreal, the subsequent multiple-choice questions asked candidates to agree with the author's logic, asking them to identify why family discipline was collapsing:

• Was it modern education?
• Or was it that mothers no longer accepted the husband as master of the household?

Students looked up from their papers, caught their teachers' eyes, and wondered if CBSE had accidentally recycled a question paper from 1874.

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From Exam Halls to Parliament

By afternoon, screenshots of Question Paper Code 002/2/4 were circulating on Twitter, Instagram, and teacher WhatsApp groups. The internet was in stitches and in disbelief:

• Netizens joked that CBSE's paper-setter had lost an argument at breakfast and decided to take it out on 2 million teenagers.
• Others asked whether CBSE planned to follow up with a Physics paper explaining that gravity was caused by women leaving the kitchen.

By Monday morning, 13 December, the controversy reached the floor of the Indian Parliament. Congress President Sonia Gandhi raised the issue during Zero Hour in the Lok Sabha, calling the passage "blatantly misogynist and regressive" and demanding an immediate apology from the Ministry of Education.

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The Retreat

CBSE initially attempted to defend the question paper, claiming that reading comprehension passages were meant to test critical deduction rather than reflect board values.

Within hours of the parliamentary uproar, the board capitulated completely:

1. CBSE dropped the passage and its associated questions from grading.
2. All students who appeared for the exam were awarded full marks (free bonus points) for the section.
3. The board announced a high-level committee to review the question-setting and moderation process to ensure no 19th-century manifestos slipped through in future.

For the students of Class 10, it was an unexpected victory: a free score boost courtesy of CBSE's accidental comedy.

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Timeline: INC-ABS-2021-CBSE-012

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Sources & Further Reading

1. "CBSE expresses regret over Class 10 English passage on women, drops questions" — The Indian Express, 13 December 2021. indianexpress.com
2. "CBSE Class 10 English Exam: Passage on women triggers massive outrage" — NDTV, 12 December 2021. ndtv.com
3. "Sonia Gandhi raises 'regressive' CBSE question in Lok Sabha" — The Hindu, 13 December 2021. thehindu.com