Chennai: The Congress poll promise to scrap the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (Neet) for Tamil Nadu is a mere eyewash, the state unit of the BJP has said.
Reacting to the Congress assurance in its poll manifesto released on Tuesday, BJP state executive committee member Narayanan Thirupathy questioned that party’s rationale in replacing the Neet examination with a state-level examination of equivalent standard. “The promise to scrap the Neet is a mere eyewash,” he added.
The Congress, which assured to scrap the Neet in Tamil Nadu, said the exam is discriminatory against students from certain States. “In addition, it interferes with the state government’s right to admit students domiciled in the state to medical colleges in that state. Hence, we will take measures to dispense with the Neet examination and substitute it with a state-level examination of equivalent standard, approved by the competent authority for admission to medical colleges in that State,” the party’s manifesto said.
The Congress ally, the DMK which has long been opposing the examination, too had promised to scrap the medical entrance exam, in its election manifesto for the April 18 Lok Sabha election, released last week.
Neet has been a burning issue in Tamil Nadu for several years now and late Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa had ensured that Neet was not imposed on students in the State during her tenure. However, after her passing, the ruling AIADMK has not managed to get an exemption for the students from Neet. However, in its poll manifesto the AIADMK assured to strive for the scrapping of Neet.
However, BJP State president, Dr. Tamilisai Soundararajan criticised the DMK for putting Neet abolition on its
manifesto and sought to know how it would manage to get an exemption when there was a Supreme Court order on the same.
