Tamil Nadu Government has set the stage for a collision course with the Centre on the issue of the National Eligibility and Entrance Examination (NEET), the uniform test conceived by the Government of India for the whole country to regulate and streamline admission to undergraduate and post graduate courses in medical and dental colleges and also to liberate the medical education in the country from the evil system of capitation fee.
Private medical colleges in Tamil Nadu charge anything between Rs 5 million to Rs 10 million for management quota seat in MBBS based on the existing admission system.
The AIADMK government introduced a Bill in the legislative Assembly on Tuesday to circumvent the 2016 Supreme Court verdict which ordered that admission to all medical and dental colleges in the country should be based on a common admission test (NEET). One of the demands of the Jallikkattu demonstrators at Marina Beach held last month was the abolition of NEET and continuation of the present admission procedure.
"The bulk of the students from Tamil Nadu appearing for NEET come from rural areas. They do not have access to modern coaching facilities to equip themselves to face these tests. This is due to the paucity of funds and the poor economic condition of these students," C Vijaya Bhaskar, minister for health and family welfare, who introduced the Bill told the House. He also claimed that the NEET was based on the CBSE syllabus which was different from the syllabus of the Board of Higher Secondary Examination in Tamil Nadu.
Though the NEET was to be held from 2016 itself, some state governments including Tamil Nadu had claimed that the test based on CBSE curriculum would put students from these states in difficulty as they were from poor socio-economic background. In a letter addressed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May 2016, late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa had argued that 'NEET was out of tune with the prevailing socio-economic milieu and administrative requirements of Tamil Nadu'.
She had also pointed out that Tamil Nadu has a different admission policy to the under graduate medical and dental colleges which have been upheld by the Madras High Court and has been affirmed by the Apex Court.
The Centre had promulgated an ordinance in 2016 to give the students a one-year respite to help them get ready for the NEET from 2017. The decision of the Tamil Nadu government is seen as a retrograde move by leading medical educators. Dr P B Gopalakrishnan, former professor of medicine, Madras Medical College said that the NEET was the ideal process to streamline medical education in the country. "This is surprising. How can we argue that we will have a separate system while the whole country is going ahead with a uniform patternIJ" asked Prof Gopalakrishnan.