With thousands of people simultaneously trying to find out the results of the Higher Secondary (Science) examination, the lines got clogged. So www.gujaratindia.com and www.gsebresults.com, the sites where the Gujarat Secondary Education Board had put the results, remained elusive.

It was not before 5.05 pm, that someone in the crowd of officials and journalists that had gathered in the Secretariat here could get a result. It was the same story in Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Rajkot and Surat. In numerous small towns and villages, where there are no Internet connections, it was worse.

At Satguru Overseas in Ahmedabad, everybody breathed a sigh of relief when, at 4.30 pm, the sitewas finally located. But when the number was keyed in, there was no result.

Clearly, in its anxiety to be the first education board to put its results on the Internet, GSEB overlooked a few problems, like the limited capacity of lines. So, everywhere, anxious students and parents, having failed to find their results, crowded offices of District Education Officers on a hot, sultry afternoon.

Some irate parents described GSEB's promise of putting results on the Internet as ``a publicity stunt''. They had wasted hours on the computer, before coming to the DEO office.

Pratiksha, a student of Convent of Jesus and Mary School in Vadodara, wondered why the results were difficult to get on the Net when ``Internet is all about hi-tech''. Viral Parekh, senior marketing executive of Aptech Computer Education at Vadodara, felt there was some problem at the GSEB's end or with the server.

In Rajkot, it was only around 4.15 pm that the much-sought-after sites could be reached. And the only information available wasabout the State toppers. Even the names of the top 10 scorers from Rajkot were not there. Jamnagar was a little better. It had the names of toppers in the district. But that was all.

As in Ahmedabad, the officials at the District Education Office in Rajkot turned out to be more reliable. They released the results at the scheduled time. Certain media institutions also managed to get the result faxed to them much before it was available on the Net and displayed it outside their offices.

While such was the situation in big towns, one can only imagine the mess in small towns and villages where there are no Internet connections. In the morning, GSEB Chairman G D Vyas was asked about how they proposed to make the results available in these areas. His reply was: ``You cannot stay away from modern technology because certain areas are still in the bullock cart age''. Vyas may now have the satisfaction that GSEB has joined the information superhighway. But it is cruising at the pace of a bullock cart.

That is notthe only complaint people had. Kasturi Rao, Principal of the Baroda High School at Bagikhana, said the new system had robbed the schools of the opportunity of declaring the results and congratulating the students. Neha Kalia, a student of Convent of Jesus and Mary School in Vadodara, said it was invading privacy, as ``anybody can see your result''. Prajit Menon of Don Bosco High School at Vadodara complained that the Net did not give the break-up of different subjects. Earlier, GSEB used to send the detailed marks to schools along with the results. This time, they will have to wait a day as the board will send the marksheets tomorrow.