Chief minister Mamata Banerjee has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take steps to restore the old system of holding JEE (medical) by the respective states and abolish the NEET examination which involved rampant corruption.
She also demanded an impartial probe into the allegations of paper leak, taking bribes by certain people, and the involvement of the officials in conducting the examination, giving grace marks etc.
Alleged corruption in leaking NEET (UG) question paper has come out at a time when the Centre cancelled the NEET (PG) examination.
She wrote that the decentralised system of holding the medical examination was later changed to a centralized system so as to take complete control of all the admissions in the country in the medical courses without any involvement of the state governments. “This is completely unacceptable and violates the true spirits of the federal structure of the country,” she said, adding, “The present system has led to massive corruption, which benefits only the rich who can also afford to pay, while the meritorious students belonging to the poor and middle class suffer and are the biggest victims.”
She said before 2017, the state government and the centre used to conduct the entrance examinations for the medical students separately. This system was functioning smoothly and without any problems. This was better attuned to the regional curricula and educational standards. The state government usually spends more than Rs 50 lakh per doctor on education and internship. The state government should be given the freedom to select medical students through Joint Entrance Examination.