Chennai: Opposition parties stepped up their attack on the Centre for the manner in which CBSE traumatised over 5,000 Tamil Nadu students, sending them to distant places to take the Neet exam.
They also slammed the AIADMK government for not acting tough in getting an exemption from Neet for TN students by at least ensuring they had centres inside the state.
DMK working president M.K. Stalin said Neet “is taking nara-bali (human sacrifice) every year and we must halt Neet before it takes one more life”.
Reacting to the death of Krishnasamy, who reportedly died due to a cardiac arrest in Ernakulam on Sunday after seeing off his son to the Neet centre there, Mr. Stalin said, “We lost Anitha last year and now Krishnasamy of Thiruthuraipoondi, had died because of stress and anxiety. His doctor-aspirant son Kasturi Mahalingam, who hopes to save many lives after becoming doctor, will regret all through his life that he could not save his father.”
In a statement, Mr Stalin said the state government should take legal steps to get permanent exemption from Neet for TN students, otherwise this eligibility test would claim many more lives if the officials continue to “serve as puppets to the Central government.”
Lashing out at the Centre, MDMK chief Vaiko said “the students have been reduced to the plight of refugees – like Eelam refugees, unable to write the test in their own state despite living in a free country like India.” “There is no clemency for the Central government for this anarchy or for the state government, which failed to protect the rights of Tamils on Neet,” he said while expressing distress over the plight of parents and Neet candidates who faced hardship in not being able to get accommodation or food in Kerala.
Immediately after Krishnaswamy died, he spoke to Kerala Governor Sadasivam over phone and he in turn informed the Ernakulam Collector to make arrangements to send Krishnasamy’s body to Tamil Nadu. “This (death) is most cruel. Such a thing has never happened even during the British rule,” Mr Vaiko said.
