SAD welcomes Anti-Paper Leak Bill, urges Centre to let states conduct their own recruitment exams
Babushahi Bureau
Chandigarh, July 26, 2026: The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Sunday welcomed the proposed Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Amendment Bill, 2026, while urging the Centre to empower states to conduct examinations for their own recruitments and educational institutions.
In a statement, senior SAD leader Dr Daljit Singh Cheema said that while stricter punishment for those involved in paper leaks was a welcome step, punitive measures alone would not be enough to safeguard the integrity of public examinations.
Calling for greater decentralisation, Dr Cheema said the Union Government should establish uniform national security standards while allowing states to independently conduct examinations for their own recruitments and institutions.
He said such an approach, in line with the spirit of cooperative federalism, would reduce systemic risks, improve accountability, strengthen public confidence and better protect the aspirations of millions of students.
Dr Cheema also stressed the need for the proposed legislation to focus equally on preventive measures. He said the law should mandate robust standard operating procedures (SOPs), secure technology, end-to-end accountability, regular security audits and foolproof examination protocols to prevent paper leaks before they occur.
He further argued that India's vast geographical spread, linguistic diversity, varying levels of infrastructure and technology, along with the logistical challenge of transporting confidential examination papers to thousands of centres, make highly centralised examinations more vulnerable to security breaches.
The SAD leader said a decentralised examination system backed by strong national standards would be more effective in ensuring transparency, accountability and the credibility of public examinations.