The Tamil Nadu Assembly on Monday passed a bill seeking a permanent exemption to the state from NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test), and admissions to undergraduate courses in medicine, dentistry, Indian medicine and homoeopathy on the basis of marks obtained by students in Class 12 board examinations.
The Tamil Nadu Admission to Undergraduate Medical Degree Courses Bill, 2021 (Anti-NEET bill), was supported by all parties, including the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), except for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The bill was introduced after a 19-year-old medical aspirant died by suicide at his home in Salem hours before the NEET examination.
Speaking at the state Assembly, Chief Minister M.K. Stalin slammed the previous AIADMK government for ruling in silence under NDA-alliance and not raising voice for people of the state. “You (AIADMK) were in alliance with Centre, you still are. When it came to voting for the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 (CAA) and farm laws, you should’ve imposed conditions of exemption from NEET. You didn’t have the courage to raise your voice, you ruled in silence until the death of aspirants,” said Stalin.
The Chief Minister asserted that his government took steps to cancel the NEET examination as soon as it came to power. “The government is taking all constructive steps to cancel the NEET examination and enroll students in medical education on the basis of Class 12 marks. I request you all to support the Bill (seeking permanent exemption from NEET),” he added seeking the Opposition’s support to the bill.
NEET is the all-India level entrance examination for undergraduate medical courses. This year, the examination was held on 12 September across the country. The NEET 2021 examination was delayed due to the second wave of the Covid-19 outbreak. Earlier, the Supreme Court had refused to defer the NEET and had dismissed the plea of a batch of students who contended that the medical entrance examination will be clashing with other examinations. The SC said that it does not want to interfere with the process and it will be “very unfair” to reschedule it. The SC bench had said that 16 lakh students take NEET and it can’t be deferred on the plea of a few students.
Many students have questioned why the TN government wants to scrap the NEET while is not against JEE Mains, which is a centralised entrance examination for engineering. The state government claims that the centralised, single-day examination puts pressure on students. Unlike engineering aspirants who have state and central level examinations, for medical aspirants, there is only one examination—NEET—for admission to both central and state level colleges.
DMK MP Kanimozhi on Monday said that the NEET is against social justice and the state wants its students to be given a fair chance and equal opportunity. Speaking about the bill, the DMK MP said, “We are against the NEET; we don’t want NEET. We want our students to be given a fair chance and equal opportunity. This is against social justice.” Stalin’s DMK had made the abolition of NEET a poll promise.
Tamil Nadu has proposed that students can also be admitted to medical colleges based on Class 12 score and NEET will not be the only gateway to “ensure social justice and protect all vulnerable student communities from being discriminated against admission to medical education programmes”. The Tamil Nadu government has proposed to offer a reservation of 7.5% seats in medical colleges for students from government schools.
The alternative admission route is yet to be finalised. The passing of the bill in the Assembly formalises the opposition to NEET by the DMK government. It sets the stage for state-Centre collaborative exchange over how to exempt the state from the controversial medical test. The Centre was already looking at options of holding NEET multiple times a year. The Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health were in discussions to hold the medical entrance examination twice a year. While this was proposed to be implemented this year, it could not be put into place due to a lack of consensus.
A final call on NEET—which could include an alternative mode or decentralisation of examination or multiple attempts or any other way out—will be announced after discussions between the Centre and state. Till now, admissions to medical colleges are administered centrally under All India quota which marks 15% of total seats, while the rest are filled by states based on NEET scores.
Tamil Nadu had earlier set up a committee to study the social and economic impacts of NEET. The Madras High Court had dismissed a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Tamil Nadu BJP leader K. Nagarajan against the setting up of the committee. The committee had found that students who get admissions to medical colleges based on NEET perform poorer than those who get admissions based on Class 12 scores. The report also suggested that students from affluent families tend to score better in the examination. The demand for scrapping the examination escalated on social media platforms yesterday when a 19-year-old allegedly died of suicide fearing failure in the medical entrance examination. After the demise of the NEET aspirant, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister said that the “legal battle to scrap NEET will continue”.