The National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) has caused a lot of confusion and protests from both students and parents this year. All medical and dental aspirants should write NEET in order to get admission in any medical or dental college in the country. This includes private and government-aided colleges. NEET nullified all the state-level entrance examinations and examinations conducted by private colleges. This led to many state governments and private colleges protesting against this decision. State governments had the option of conducting the tests in their respective regional languages. This option was not available through NEET.
What and How
The aftermath of strict implementation of NEET is grim. Since, the final decision on the NEET score was delayed, colleges couldn’t fill all the seats in all colleges by 30th September 2016. Sankalp Trust did some research and found that more than 5000 seats remained vacant all over the country in the academic year 2016-2017. The five thousand seats include both medical and dental seats in various medical and dental colleges in the country. The source for this figure was the number of seats listed on the website of various states.
After the information was collected, Sankalp Trust has filed a petition in the Supreme Court. As per the petition, the apex court has to direct the colleges about the procedure to fill the vacant seats. The apex court has to carry this out by centralized counseling and using the NEET merit list.
The petition also stated that the main reason for the situation was the confusion and misunderstandings created by NEET. NEET had also assigned September 30, 2016 as the last day for the completion of admission procedure. This duration was not sufficient for colleges to complete the admission procedure. The main reason for the time crunch was that, Supreme Court passed the rule that NEET was compulsory to gain admission to private and deemed colleges two days before the AIPMT examination on May 1, 2016.
The case will have its first hearing in the apex court on October 28, 2016. Prashant Bhushan will represent the case.
In 2016, NEET was conducted in two phases. The phase two was conducted for students who could not appear for phase one. Examinations conducted by state governments were also exempted from NEET for the academic year 2016-17. From the next academic year, only NEET will be held throughout the country without any exemptions. The syllabus for NEET will be NCERT syllabus and undergraduate exam will be conducted by Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) while the postgraduate examination will be conducted by National Board of Examination (NBE).
Dr. Gulshan Garg, Sankalp Trust said that there is a need for doctors in the country and we are not in a position to leave even a single seat vacant.