Parliament passes bills assigning constitutional status to NEET

•  The Indian Medical Council (Amendment) Bill, 2016 and the The Dentists (Amendment) Bill, 2016 are passed by Parliament to provides a Constitutional status to the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) examination" which is intended to be introduced in the academic session next year.
• These bills are passed with the aim to bring private colleges under the ambit of the Indian Medical Council (Amendment) Bill and Dentist (Amendment) Bill.
• NEET, is a common entrance test system for admission to undergraduate and postgraduate medical courses.
• This exam was firstly introduced in 2012. Many states like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, opposed it because they believed that it infringed upon their right to keep education a State subject.

Analysis:

• NEET had a few laudable objectives: saving students the trouble of writing multiple entrance examinations to medical courses in State-run and private institutions, curbing the increasing commercialisation of higher education in medicine, and ensuring a transparent admission process in private, unaided institutions which thrive on selling MBBS and postgraduate medical specialty seats to the highest bidder.
• However there is some opposition to this test . Firstly, State governments were upset with the implicit centralisation of medical education in the idea of a national test. They feared that NEET would undermine their reservation policy. Some like Tamil Nadu see all entrance tests as elitist and against the interests of poor and rural students. And secondly, private institutions, especially those established by minorities, were against any interference in their admission process, arguing that its their unfettered right to regulate their own admissions and introducing NEET violated their constitutional rights.
• This would also adversely affect the interests of students in the State, in particular those from weaker sections and from rural areas and as it infringes upon the State’s right to determine the admission policies to medical educational institutions
• But NEET merely creates a national pool of eligible candidates from among whom colleges and institutions were free to select those belonging to any preferred minority group or any reserved category.
• NEET would avoid multiple entrance tests and minimise corruption and irregularities in admissions to medical courses.

By: Vishal