The national examinations for class 12 in Kathmandu, Nepal, which were supposed to start on Thursday, have been rescheduled till May 4 because government school instructors have refused to take the test until the School Education Bill has been passed.

According to local media, the Nepalese National Examination Board (NEB) met Tuesday night and agreed to postpone the exams in response to Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli’s request.

According to The Kathmandu Post, the country’s top newspaper, PM Oli requested that the NEB chair Mahashram Sharma and Education Secretary Deepak Kafle postpone the test by a few days.

“The exams have been rescheduled for May 4th, a 10-day delay. The NEB’s test controller, Krishna Prasad Sharma, said that the professors were not prepared to participate in the procedure, hence a deferral was required.

According to reports, up to 550,000 pupils in Nepal are taking the test.

If the instructors didn’t comply, the board had previously intended to administer the tests with the assistance of local units and public personnel. In less than ten hours, however, the judgement was reversed.

“The administration announced that it would use civil personnel to administer the exams in an attempt to scare us. However, it was unable to maintain that choice, even for a few hours. The government’s decision to cancel it is a positive thing. The co-chair of the Nepal Teachers’ Federation, Nanu Maya Parajuli, stated, “I want to caution them not to make such foolish choices in the future.”

The Teachers’ Federation accused the NEB and district-level examination coordination committees of intimidating teachers and principals to assist in administering the grade 12 tests in a statement released on Tuesday.

Additionally, all school employees have been requested by the Nepal School Employees Council to shut their respective institutions and leave for Kathmandu with the keys within a day.

“As we have received reports that school staff are being assigned tasks such as student admissions, publication of results, and involvement in the Grade 12 examinations during the ongoing movement, all staff concerned are requested to compulsorily participate in the historic movement currently taking place in Kathmandu by bringing the school keys within 24 hours of receiving this notice,” the council stated in a statement.

According to local media, Bidya Bhattarai, Nepal’s Education Minister, recently resigned as well after clashing with Prime Minister Oli and Finance Minister Bishnu Paudel over opposing teachers’ requests for benefits and bonuses.

Since April 2, the teacher’s protests and sit-ins in Kathmandu’s Maitighar-Naya Baneshwor neighbourhood have seriously hampered the country’s enrolment campaign and postponed important academic assignments, such reviewing answer sheets from the most recent Secondary Education Examination (SEE).

The instructors disregarded the government’s directive to start enrolling students for Nepal’s April 15 start of the new school year.