State Class XII Pass Rate Dips By 5 To 7% Across All Three Major Streams
Guwahati: After last year's notable improvement in Class XII
state board examination results
, the pass percentage has declined across all three major streams this year, dropping by 5% to 7%. The
Assam State School Education Board
(ASSEB) announced the results on Wednesday morning.
Pass rates in the science and commerce streams saw a dip of around 5% compared to the previous year, while the arts stream witnessed a more significant decline of seven percent.
"There has been about a 5% decrease in the pass percentage compared to last year. However, I am satisfied with the results. ASSEB declared the results within 44 days of the examination's completion, which is commendable," said state education minister
Ranoj Pegu
. Though Pegu said detailed analysis is needed for the decline, he suggested that changes in the question paper format might have contributed to the shift.
"In the higher secondary examination, we have changed the question paper pattern, similar to the matric exams. Alongside MCQs, focus has been given on conceptual questions to assess students' critical and creative thinking. The number of factual questions has been reduced," Pegu said.
A senior official from ASSEB said for the first time, the number of students appearing for the Class XII state board examination crossed three lakh. The poor performance by a substantial number of students might have played a role in the overall drop in pass percentages.
"In the last 10 years, the results graph has never followed a straight line. Fluctuations are often influenced by the batch of candidates. While a detailed analysis is required, this decline is not alarming," ASSEB secretary Naranarayan Nath said.
Whereas in science stream, the pass percentage has dropped to 84.88this year from 89.88 last year, in commerce and arts the decline has been from 87.66% (2024) to 82.18% (2025) and 88.36% (2024) to 81.03% (2025), respectively. In vocational stream, only 1,202 candidates appeared and the pass percentage has been 68.55%.
In all streams, girls outperformed boys. In science, the girls' pass percentage was 85.54, whereas pass percentage of boys was 84.39. Girls pass percentage in arts has been 82.95, whereas the pass percentage of boys has been 78.42. In commerce, the pass percentages of girls and boys have been 82.4 and 82.08, respectively. In vocational stream, girls pass percentage has been 74.39, whereas that of the boys has been 65.53.
Highest 2.26 lakh students appeared from the arts stream, while science recorded 56,909 candidates, and commerce had 17,746. The Class XII results were declared within the shortest span of time this year, earning appreciation from CM Himanta Biswa Sarma.
For the first time, rank holder was announced. ASSEB also introduced a certificate-cum-marksheet, combining both documents into a single entity.
In science, the top three performing districts are West Karbi Anglong (100%), Sivasagar (97.13%) and Baksa (95.66%), whereas Dima Hasao remained at the bottom of the tally with 56.27%.
In arts, the top three districts are, Baksa (94.21%), Darrang (93.82%) and Sivasagar (90.78%), while Cachar stood at the bottom with 58.96%.
In commerce, South Salmara Mankachar district produced 100% results, followed by Baksa with 98.2% and Chirang district with 98.15%
On the other hand, in vocational stream, Sribhumi, Lakhimpur, Nalbari and Biswanath each recorded pass percentage of 100.
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