Honorable Director,

Royal Institute of Management,

Thimphu.

Head of Department,

Master of Business Administration,

Royal Institute of Management.

We are writing this letter to bring to your attention that the majority of us are not comfortable sitting for our exams in a closed room or attending a class filled with 75 students in one room. The country recorded 210 community cases in one day (17.02.2022) which shows that the new variant is highly transmissible and poses a higher risk to people with medical comorbidities, children below 12 who are not vaccinated, and elderlies.

We understand that the Institute has been forthcoming and supportive to all our pleas thus far, but in today’s circumstances, all of us are hesitant and mentally not prepared to comply with the Institute’s requirements. We also understand that the requirement to attend face-to-face classes for Industrial Business is necessary and it’s with good intention that the Institute would want us to learn more by being physically present. Unfortunately, all of us have elderlies, children, and some with medical comorbidities living in the same house and we can’t afford to risk their safety merely because the Institute wouldn’t agree on take-home exams or online classes la.

As we see the number of cases increasing day by day, it would be foolish and reckless on our part if we adhere to the Institute’s requirement of attending physically for the exam and classes because we have the alternative to do it through other means. We have witnessed our beloved King traveling around the most dangerous places ensuring that the front-liners and the citizens are safe from this deadly virus. The Government is trying its best to contain the spread of the virus because all of us know that irrespective of the fact that whether the virus takes away life or not, it can cripple our health delivery system, and being the recipient of all, we are at loss la.

The WHO has stated that “Based on the currently available evidence, the overall risk related to Omicron remains very high. Omicron has a significant growth advantage over Delta, leading to rapid spread in the community with higher levels of incidence than previously seen in this pandemic. Despite a lower risk of severe disease and death following infection than previous SARS-CoV-2 variants, the very high levels of transmission nevertheless have resulted in significant increases in hospitalization, continue to pose overwhelming demands on health care systems in most countries, and may lead to significant morbidity, particularly in vulnerable populations.”(WHO, 2021 at https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/enhancing-readiness-for-omicron-(b.1.1.529)-technical-brief-and-priority-actions-for-member-states )

Furthermore, on 17.02.2022 Kuensel reported that at a school in Dewathang where all students and teachers were tested before going into containment mode, 25 students and 7 teachers have tested positive for the virus. This only shows that the incubation period for the virus is longer and the transmissibility is faster than any variant that has been known to scientists.

Thus, our earnest plea and request to the learned authorities are to kindly consider taking the examination for Economics for Managers as a take-home exam and to conduct the Business Industrial Unit as an online class, thereby curtailing the spread of the virus la.