Some time back, I was traveling around Western Jharkhand, conducting interviews with politicians and journalists for work. During this period, I discovered a university nearby run by a local BJP MLA. My enthusiasm for educational institutions often leads me to randomly explore the websites of historically significant colleges, marveling at their expansive campuses. While visiting the college with my colleague, I was amazed by its vastness. On our way back to Daltonganj city, a question arose in my mind, and I quickly turned to my colleague to ask about NEET. I was curious about his perspective on the exam.
The question has lingered in my mind since I saw an Instagram post by a Telugu activist. The post questioned why Southern States should sacrifice medical seats in their colleges for students from Northern India. The activist provided background, arguing that the Southern states fund these institutions and should have the right to govern them. They pointed out that while Southern states prioritized establishing colleges, Northern states either focused less on such institutions or on less relevant projects like statues and appeasement welfare schemes. By the way, these statues and schemes aren’t irrelevant to South India, but somehow they’ve managed to find a balance. For instance, Andhra Pradesh constructed one of the tallest statues of Dr. Ambedkar and sanctioned at least one state-run medical college in each district of the state. Additionally, Southern states have been successful in controlling population growth and managing resources effectively, while Northern states lag behind in fertility reduction. Given this context, the question arises: why should Southern states sacrifice their fair share of medical seats?
When I asked my colleague about this, he responded with generic answers like merit-based counseling and the division of resources across states as part of India. I was not satisfied with these points, as I had counterarguments for each.
Firstly, I don't believe in the merit-based counseling system. Judging standards at a young age seems flawed. Who knows? After entering college and interacting with like-minded people, even an average-scoring student might outperform others with the support of professors and available resources. Excluding them from opportunities at the outset seems like a significant mistake. NEET has become a numbers game. Students who spend multiple years preparing for the exam are likely to succeed, and given the population and coaching dynamics in Northern states, they end up with a disproportionate share of seats compared to Southern students.
Regarding nationalism, I explained to my colleague that I consider myself a nationalist and support common examinations, which is why this question troubles me. I seek a more convincing answer to address the concerns of those who oppose NEET. States have the right to decide how to allocate their budgets. Southern states have chosen to invest in educational institutions to enhance human resources, while Northern states have not focused as much on such initiatives. Now, the central government is mandating that Northern candidates be allocated seats in institutions funded and established by Southern states. This seems biased to me.
I have no issue with the government implementing such provisions in institutions funded by central resources, like AIIMS, which are established and run by the central government with its own funds. However, imposing such a mandate on state-funded institutions, as seen in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, where state governments invested in colleges for their own students, seems unfair. If the central government wants to enforce a common examination, it should manage all medical colleges, fund them, and then implement such policies. It should not compel state governments to sacrifice the future of their students for the benefit of others.
I’m seeking a convincing answer to reconcile my nationalist viewpoint with the current system. If you have thoughts on this, I’d be interested in hearing them.
Note: The NEET paper leak is a different issue which I am frustrated to even speak about, but that is again more of an administrative issue that a core one. We will try to get on that later if my office work completes early some day.
Link: Social media account of the activist. https://www.instagram.com/akshar.am/
Update: V1
The other day I was having a dicussion with a senior of mine regarding the whole NEET issue and I presented my views on the topic. Then he discussed a new perspective to the discussion which is the "Medical Admissions Mafia". For beginners, it is like this.
Earlier before the introduction of the NEET exam, the medical colleges which used to be controlled by a very elite and powerful groups which used to have close relations with the political parties. The best example for this is the how medical colleges in Tamil Nadu have close relations with the DMK government who used to get shares of the money. Also a single seat used to cost at least 2-4 Cr. This is true as I have earlier read on the this. Also it's not like North Indian's are not able to get the admissions earlier, the rich are able to fill the pockets and used to study from the southern colleges even before the introduction of NEET too. Again the standards of the entrance exams is questionable with frequent paper leaks and papers for sales through internal circles.
His argument was that, with the introduction of the NEET exam, the central government is able to standardise the system across the country and ensuring the exam standards (recent NEET paper scam is different matter). Also with the transparent admission process and heavy investment in construction of the medical colleges which grew 50x in comparison to the Pre-Modi governance helped in distributing to benefits to all sections of the society and not restricting it to the elite circles (especially the public medical colleges are set up at a rapid pace including both central government with AIIMS style institutions and the state government with District wise medical colleges as observed in Andhra Pradesh. Some state governments are going a step ahead and starting a AIIMS+ institutions to cross the medical quality standards set up the country premier medical institution.
After this discussion, I can say that I was convinced to put my weight behind the central government in the issue of NEET exam.
Also, the second reason behind introducing the NEET exam is to cut off the incomes sources of the regional parties especially in the southern states where the medical college mafia and the regional parties are in nexus to gain admission money which the used during the election campaigning.
