Netting the best

The Centre has done well to amend the Indian Medical Council Act 1956 and the Dentist Act 1948 in order to conduct a unified National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) to admit students to government-run as well as private medical and dental colleges across the country, effective from next year. The single national level exam will provide relief to millions of students who appear for multiple entrance tests every year in the hope of securing a medical college seat. For post-graduate admissions, NEET will be the norm when qualifying exams are held in December. In this context, it is commendable that the Supreme Court has refrained from intervening in an alleged case of leak of NEET papers filed before it.

While NEET is a good start, the Centre needs to bring about more changes to this national entrance exam. One, NEET should not be held just once or twice a year but multiple times in a year like the US’s Scholastic Aptitude or Graduate Management Admission tests. That will allow candidates to take the test multiple times in a calendar year and at a time for her choice. The Graduate Management Admission Council allows candidates to take the management school entrance exam every 16 days and up to five times in a calendar year. Likewise, the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), which is widely used for admissions to colleges in the US, is offered seven times in a year. Secondly, in keeping with the Digital India mission, the tests should go online rather than asking examinees to mark on machine gradable answer sheets. That will make assessments faster and more accurate. Further, such tests should be extended to all admissions that are based on competitive exams, rather than allowing multiple examinations to be conducted by different State governments, universities and institutions. To begin with, all graduate-level entrance exams should be converted into a single national-level test. Currently, students seeking admission to engineering and law courses, along with their guardians, travel the length and breadth of the country appearing for various tests. That costs a lot of money — families need to spend on brochures, admission forms, exam fees and travel. The only beneficiaries of the system are the institutions conducting these examinations.

A single, common national exam for all professional courses will be a great leveller. One, it will ensure candidates across the country are judged on the same set of parameters irrespective of what their background is and the quality of education they had access to. That will prevent tweaks that individual institutions make to entrance tests to enable non-meritorious students to qualify. Two, it will also ensure that money power does not trump merit — many bright candidates are unable to afford the cost of appearing for multiple entrance tests and thus opt out. Three, it may somewhat curb the proliferation of capitation fee-dependent institutions. There will be many with entrenched interests who would attempt to undermine NEET-like examinations. They must not be allowed to succeed.

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