So far, teachers of primary schools were assigned the task.

From marking the answer sheets to announcing the result, these teachers will handle the entire process of the examination to be held under the Sarv Shisha Abhiyan this time.

However, the decision to rope in secondary school teachers hasn’t gone down well with the staff of primary schools.

“These teachers are not in touch with the Class V syllabus. They will not be able to do justice to the answer sheets,” Baldev Singh Mangat, president of the Punjab School Teachers Association, said.

Another complaint of the primary school teachers: “After being made to do all “clerical tasks” by the Education Department, they were ignored when it came to examination duties,” Sher Singh, president of Primary Teachers Association, said.

“The teachers, head-teachers, centre head-teachers and block primary education officers (gazetted officers) were involved in clerical work — compiling the data of candidate names with their particulars. They helped the department feed this data in the software, but they were ignored,” Mahender Singh Kamalpura, president of Democratic Teachers Front, Ludhiana, added.

In Ludhiana, more than 55,000 students will take the Class V exams from March 16 to 21, while about ten lakh students in the state will take the exam.