The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is a national-level educational board, an institution controlled and managed by the Government of India's Ministry of Education. It is responsible for governing public and private schools and ensuring a uniform standard of education across the country and in 28 foreign countries. The CBSE was originally established in 1929 by a government resolution as an experiment in inter-state integration in secondary education. It was later reconstituted on July 1, 1962, to extend its services and address the educational needs of students whose parents had transferable jobs across India.
The core mechanism of the CBSE involves prescribing and updating the course of instructions, textbooks, and teaching methodology for its affiliated schools, which must follow the curriculum designed by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). Its primary function is to conduct the public examinations for the All India Secondary School Examination (AISSE) for Class 10 and the All India Senior School Certificate Examination (AISSCE) for Class 12. The CBSE also previously conducted major national entrance exams like the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) and the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), but these functions were transferred to the National Testing Agency (NTA), which was created in 2017.
Recent changes, driven by the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, have focused on shifting from rote learning to competency-based education. For the academic year 2025-2026, the CBSE has introduced a major structural reform for Class 10 students, allowing them to appear for the board exam twice a year, in February and May, with the higher score being considered final. Furthermore, the exam pattern for Classes 11 and 12 has been revised to increase the weightage of competency-based questions to 50%. The board has also mandated a third language from Class 6, with the goal of making it part of the Class 10 board examination structure by 2031.