Bengaluru: The Centre’s decision to maintain uniformity in framing question papers in all languages for National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) from next year is expected to provide relief for medical and dental aspirants, who prefer to take the test in vernacular languages.
Welcoming the decision, Medical Education Minister Sharan Prakash Patil told Deccan Chronicle, “NEET has become a level playing field now by eliminating confusions regarding the difficulty level of the questions set.” Domicile students would now stand a chance to opt for Kannada, he added.
NEET 2017 had stirred controversy with students from Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, West Bengal and Karnataka alleging difference in questions from those which appeared in the English and Hindi versions. The developments even led to the results getting delayed by 15 days with the Madras High Court staying the declaration of results.
According to Chandan Chand, Senior Assistant Director at Aakash Institute, the decision to have different question papers for different languages itself was confusing which paved way to dubious results. “When admission to all medical and dental colleges pan India is conducted based on a single test, having a question paper set with the same difficulty level is essential and just. Better late than never, the uniformity in questions will now lead to uniformity to the whole process including admissions,” he said.
Over one lakh students in total had opted to attend the test in regional languages including Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Assamese, Telugu, Marathi and Odia, apart from Kannada. Sachin, who was one among the 712 candidates who took the test in Kannada this year, thinks he would not have given up on his BDS dreams if not for the difference in the difficulty level. “We realised that candidates who chose Kannada medium had to face difficult questions only when the answer key was out. I had to take up agriculture now to avoid loss of a year,” he said.
He added that the decision offers hope to him as he would still try repeating next year with the level equalized.
