Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal, while responding to the allegations of blaming the previous UPA governments for the NEET mess, said that “The current National Testing Authority has messed up. I am shocked by the kind of corruption that has been shown. Whenever something like this happens under the current government, they start blaming the previous UPA. He said that the NEET regulation was introduced in 2010. It was under the Ministry of Health, not the Ministry of Education.
Sibal said the Medical Council of India is an independent body. Then in 2010 the Board of Governors introduced the regulation of National Eligibility Test. That regulation was challenged by writ petitioners. It was struck down by the Supreme Court saying that MCI has no legislative competence. In 2014, review was allowed and the 2013 order of the Supreme Court was withdrawn. In 2016 the BJP came to power and this (NDA) government introduced Section 10D and amended the Indian Medical Council Act 1956 and introduced a new section called Section 10D. The Medical Council Act was passed. It included a new Section 14 for the NEET exam. The Supreme Court upheld the law. It has nothing to do with the UPA.”
Speaking to news agency PTI, Kapil Sibal said, “The issue is not the NEET exam issue, I think the issue is the kind of corruption that is happening. We have seen it happening in Uttar Pradesh. The kind of paper leak that happened in UP, we are seeing it happening all over the country. If the testing system gets corrupted in any exam, it is not really good for the Prime Minister to sit and keep quiet.”
Tamil Nadu has been protesting from the beginning
Kapil Sibal further said that “As a citizen of this country, I feel the complexity of this country is such that any kind of uniformity goes in favour of a certain section of people. The state of Tamil Nadu has been opposing the NEET exam from the very beginning. This is one of their concerns which they have expressed at the national level and something must be said about it because the exam is based on CBSE syllabus and therefore it favours students of schools which have CBSE exams. There are a lot of local boards which do not have CBSE.”
Shahnawaz replied
Meanwhile, BJP leader Shahnawaz Hussain said, “Congress is making statements and trying to provoke people. Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has clarified everything. It is our duty to protect the rights of those appearing for the NEET exam and our government is doing so.”
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