Amid raging protests from various quarters, including Chief Ministers of many States, for postponement of the upcoming JEE, NEET in the wake of coronavirus pandemic, the Centre on Thursday said the huge number of admit cards being downloaded in the past few days show that the students wanted exams to be held at any cost.
“National Testing Agency (NTA) DG told me that 7.5 lakh out of 8.58 lakh candidates in JEE have downloaded admit cards. For NEET, over 10 lakh out of 15.97 lakh candidates downloaded admit cards in 24 hours. It shows that students want that exams are held at any cost,” Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank said.
The NTA conducts both these examination 2019 onwards.
The Education Minister also said JEE exam centres have been increased to 660 from 570 while there are now 3,842 NEET centres, up from 2,546 for the convenience of students. Students have also been allotted exam centres of their choice.
A total of 15.97 lakh candidates have registered for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG) which is scheduled for September 13, said an NTA official.
Moreover, a total of 7.41 lakh candidates out of 8.58 lakh have downloaded their admit cards for JEE-Mains till Tuesday evening.
“Only 332 candidates have requested for change of their centre which is being considered positively,” the official added.
Earlier, commenting on Centre’s decision to hold the entrance examinations, Pokhriyal said, “Students and guardians constantly put pressure on us to conduct the examinations.”
He further said, “The Supreme Court of India also said the full academic year cannot be wasted. After two deferments examination dates have been finalised.”
Most significantly, Directors of IITs have stated that further delay in conducting medical and engineering entrance exams NEET and JEE will lead to a “zero academic year” and any quick alternative to the crucial exams will dilute the quality of education and have cascading effects.
“The pandemic has already disrupted the academic plans of many students and institutions and we don’t see the virus going away anytime soon. We should not let this be a zero academic year as it might have consequences on the bright future of several students,” Ajit K Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee, said.
According to Virendra Tewari, Director, IIT Kharagpur, “The exams have a global reputation for seeking excellence and are considered one of the toughest and prestigious examinations in the world. A quick alternative to these tests will certainly not be as gratifying as competing for this examination by all fair means”.
Sarit Kumar Das, Director, IIT Ropar, who is also a member of the Joint Admission Board (JAB) of IITs, said the decision to conduct the exams in September has not been taken overnight but after due consideration.
Several ruling and Opposition leaders including BJP Subramanian Swamy, LJP’s Chirag Paswan, Congress’ Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, her Odisha counterpart Naveen Patnaik, DMK president MK Stalin, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray, Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, Congress ruled States’ Chief Ministers have joined the students and parents and have demanded that the exams be postponed.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who has vehemently opposed the conduct of exams in prevailing condition has asked State Education Minister Partha Chatterjee to inquire if the NTA has included Bangla and other regional languages for JEE.
The language row over NEET and JEE examinations came to light after the NTA made available the JEE (Mains) paper in Gujarati language late last year. Banerjee had then questioned why other regional languages, including Bangla, were not included.
Afterwards, the NTA clarified it had decided to make available the JEE (Mains) paper in Gujarati since Gujarat was the only State to have approached it regarding the issue.
Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, who has strongly opposed entrance exams, said he did not favour a gap year but just postponement by two or three months.
The Congress has also announced to hold protest against Centre’s decision on Friday. The Samajwadi Party workers staged a protest outside Governor House in Lucknow against NEET/JEE exams on Thursday.
Meanwhile, over 150 academicians from various universities in India and abroad have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in written in support of conducting the exam, saying delaying JEE-Mains and NEET any further will mean compromising the future of students.
The signatories include academicians from the Delhi University, IGNOU, Lucknow University, JNU, BHU, IIT Delhi and Indian academicians from foreign universities such as University of London, University of California, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Ben Gurion University, Israel, among others.