New Delhi: The ambiguity over the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) ended on Thursday when the Supreme Court quashed the validity of the common entrance exam both for undergraduate and postgraduate medical and dental courses in government and private institutions.
In a majority judgment, Chief Justice Altamas Kabir and Justice Vikramajit Sen held that it was beyond the powers of the Medical Council of India to make such an arrangement of common entrance test both for government and private institutions.
However, in a dissenting judgment, Justice Anil R Dave dismissed the petitions by private medical and dental colleges challenging the MCI notification providing for common NEET for both undergraduate and postgraduate medical and dental courses.
The medical education standoff started with MCI's decision to conduct the first-ever common entrance examination, the NEET, for admission to MBBS and post-graduate courses in medicine as well as dental courses. The proposal was, however, opposed by the private medical and dental colleges and they moved the apex court.
In an interim order, the SC had directed the MCI and all private colleges to start their admission process, as per the old guidelines where the MCI, state governments and private colleges conduct their separate exams.
Well What i feel is this decision was obvious. Looking at the chain of events in the past months starting from Dec 2012, when SC gave permission to private colleges to conduct separate exam, it was hinted that MCI and NEET PG is on the weaker side. Then again and again SC in the interim orders quashed the main purpose and validity of NEET PG at every step, be it decision of declaring result before verdict or proceeding with separate counselling and admission. Once SC gave the interim order of proceeding with admissions to private colleges, it became almost clear that NEET PG lost the hold on the case, and SC is extending the case just as a formality.
Anyway with all this mess, the people suffers are only Medical Students/Doctors who are preparing day and night to get a decent PG seat. These uncertainities increase the mental tension among the students and cause wastage of time for preparation, the cost of which is one wasted year and harassment of preparation again.
But it looks like we Medical students has no right to say anything even after going through all this mess.
And Now again the question arises
- Who is going to conduct the entrance exam?
- When will be the exam - Dec or Jan?
- What will be the pattern - Online or Paper/pen?
The time is running out, its almost August and students are in dilemma so as to how to proceed with the preparation for next entrance exam.