The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has rolled out an alternative assessment policy for Class 12 students across West Asia and Gulf countries, after board exams scheduled between March 16 and April 10, 2026, were cancelled due to security concerns in the region.
The cancellations affected students in Bahrain, Iran, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. The new policy covers 27 subjects, including 17 academic subjects such as Maths, Biology, Economics, and English, and 10 skill-based subjects including IT, Data Science, and Artificial Intelligence.
How marks will be calculated depends on how many exams a student managed to sit before the cancellations.
Students who completed all scheduled exams will be assessed based on those results alone. Students who appeared in only some exams will have their missing subjects evaluated using school-based assessments, specifically marks from quarterly, half-yearly, and pre-board tests. Practical and internal assessment marks already uploaded by schools will be retained as submitted.
Students who did not appear in any exam will be assessed entirely on school-based performance. They may also be given the opportunity to sit exams at a later date. Compartment and single-subject students from previous years can appear in supplementary exams scheduled for July 2026.
For theory papers carrying 80 or 70 marks, CBSE will consider the best scores from quarterly, half-yearly, or pre-board exams. For subjects carrying 60, 50, or 30 marks, the final pre-board score will be used. If a student was absent for the final pre-board, earlier pre-board marks will apply instead.
Schools are required to upload all marks between April 6 and April 13, 2026, through the CBSE online platform. No corrections will be permitted after submission, and CBSE may audit the data to check for discrepancies.
After results are declared, students who do not meet qualifying criteria will be placed in the Compartment or Essential Repeat categories. Requests for photocopies and re-evaluation will be accepted through the standard CBSE process.