<span style="color: #222222;">The Tamil Nadu Government has cancelled public examinations for the Tenth Standard this year due to the looming Covid-19 situation. In an order, the government has said all the students are deemed to have passed the examinations. The marks of the students will be assessed with 80 percent weightage for the average score obtained in the Quarterly and Half Yearly examinations and 20 per cent for school attendance.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;"> </span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">Over 9.79 lakh students were earlier scheduled to appear for the examinations from the 15th of this month. The state Government's decision comes in the wake of the Madras High Court suggesting postponing the tests in view of the Covid-19 threat. There has also been a growing chorus by most of the political parties including the allies of the ruling AIADMK and a section of the parents and teachers to either defer or do away with the tests this year. Along with the 10th standard, the board exam for the last paper left for the Eleventh standard has also been abandoned. Meanwhile, in Tamil Nadu, the total number of Covid-19 infected cases has gone up to 34,914, with 1685 people tested positive in the last twenty four hours.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;"> </span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">The new cases included 1243 in Chennai. 798 people were discharged from hospitals after recovery. 21 patients succumbed to the viral disease taking the toll to 307. In Chennai, the state health department is scaling up the number of beds for treating the patients carrying the viral load. Three different medical centres are expected to add a thousand and one hundred beds more, exclusively for the Covid-19 admission, as said by the state health minister Dr C Vijayabhaskar. They include 300 beds each in the Chennai Port Trust's old hospital, the old premise of the Institute of Ophthalmology at Egmore and five hundred in the National Centre for Ageing, a centre of excellence established inside the King Institute of Preventive Medicine and Research at Guindy with the Union Government assistance.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;"> </span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">Mr Vijayabhaskar said the Guindy facility will mostly accommodate geriatric or aged patients with comorbidity conditions. Besides, several private medical college hospitals and 88 private hospitals have also come forward to allot beds exclusively for Covid-19 treatment by following the state run health insurance package.</span><br />