Cow issued admit card by J&K authorities to write exam

Srinagar: A cow, brown indeed, has got an admit card issued by authorities on her name to write a professional entrance examination next week and former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is keen on seeing her appear in the paper.

In a strange turn of events, the admit card for the entrance examination for Diploma in Polytechnic was issued by Board of Professional Entrance Examinations (BOPEE) in the name of Kachir Gaaw (Brown Cow) who is supposedly daughter of Gura Dand (Red Bull).

The cow was allotted a seat at Government Degree College Bemina for writing the examination scheduled to be held on May 10.

The incident came to light after opposition National Conference spokesman Junaid Azim Mattu uploaded a copy of the admit card on social networking site twitter.com.

"The J&K Board of Professional Entrance Examinations issued this roll-number slip to a cow after due verification. I have both the Provisional Confirmation Page for applicant Ms 'Kachir Gaw' as well as details of payment she made to BOPEE," Mattu wrote on his account.

Mattu claimed that the records about the admit card had been taken off the BOPEE site at the behest of the state government.

"However, after an informal heads-up was sent to the government, BOPEE was asked to take the record down from their website this morning. (Education Minister) Mr. Naeem Akhtar @jkpdp has some explaining to do. New benchmark of progress in Education Sector under him - COWS getting roll no slips?" Matuu added.

Former Chief Minister and National Conference working president Omar Abdullah also commented on Mattu's post saying "Brilliant. I wish Kachir Gaaw had turned up for the examination."

Controller Examinations of BOPEE Farooq Ahmad Mir said there was not much the authorities could do to prevent people from playing such pranks.

"All the applications are now made online. There is an image recognition software which does not differentiate between a human face and an animal picture. Someone has played a prank," Mir said.

Asked about his signature on the admit card issued to the cow, Mir said "I do not sign the admit cards in person. This is a system generated signature and comes by default," he said.

Mir, however, said BOPEE will file a complaint against the prankster. "We will track down the IP address of the person who has played this prank," he added.