Students Protest in Delhi, Demand End to NEET Exam and Removal of Testing Agency

Students gathered in Delhi on Sunday to voice their anger over problems with important exams like NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test) and UGC-NET (University Grants Commission-National Eligibility Test). They held their protest at Jantar Mantar, a popular place for demonstrations.

The students were particularly upset about NEET, a crucial exam for those wanting to study medicine. They claim there were serious issues with how the exam was run and want the National Testing Agency (NTA), the organization responsible for conducting NEET, to be shut down. Their posters with slogans like “Scrap NTA” and “NTA Must Go” clearly showed their frustration.

Their demands didn’t stop there. The students want the highest court in India, the Supreme Court, to investigate what they call the “mismanagement” of the NEET UG exam. They also want the Union Education Minister, Dharmendra Pradhan, to resign.

However, the government is standing its ground. On July 5th, they told the Supreme Court that they won’t cancel NEET or hold a re-exam. They insist that there were no widespread problems with the exam.

The government’s official response to the Supreme Court, which is scheduled to address petitions about this issue on Monday, states that canceling the 2024 NEET exam would harm the futures of many students who took the exam fairly. They argue that without strong evidence of cheating or leaks, canceling the exam wouldn’t be a reasonable action.

Approximately 2.4 million students hoping to get into medical schools across India took the highly competitive NEET-UG 2024 exam on May 5th. The NTA, which conducted the exam, surprised everyone by releasing the results on June 4th, earlier than the expected date of June 14th. This early release was apparently due to the answer sheets being graded ahead of schedule.