CHENNAI: Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palanisami on Wednesday urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to expedite the Presidential assent for the two pending state bills to pave way for the exemption of Tamil Nadu students from Neet. In his letter to Modi, he said the two bills- Tamil Nadu Admissions to Post Graduate Courses in Medicine and Dentistry Bill, 2017 and the Tamil Nadu Admissions to MBBS and BDS Courses Bill, 2017 had been passed unanimously in the state Assembly.
Following Neet in Tamil Nadu is bound to have consequences on the provision of quality health care to needy people in rural and remote areas. The permanent solution to ensure continuance of the present system of admission to post graduate courses in medicine and dentistry with statutory backing, is to obtain the Presidential assent at the earliest to the two Bills unanimously passed by the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly.
This would also ensure that in admission for Under Graduate courses, the students of Tamil Nadu who appear in the state board examinations, who constitute 98 per cent of the total number of eligible students would not be placed at a tremendous disadvantage in Neet because they lack the resources to enroll in training institutions and access materials available to urban students, Palanisami said.
In fact, the state government should be the sole entity to lay down the procedure for admission and fee etc. governing the institutions running in that particular State except the centrally funded institutions like IIT and NIT, he said and added that several court judgments had upheld the legislative competence of the state to enact legislation under the concurrent list which covers education including technical education, medical education and universities, he added.
