Students want JEE, NEET to be held at any cost: Education minister

Amid a growing clamour for postponing JEE and NEET in view of the pandemic situation, Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ on Thursday (August 27) said more than 17 lakh candidates have already downloaded their admit cards and this shows the students want the exams to be conducted at any cost.

“National Testing Agency (NTA) officials told me that over seven lakh candidates have downloaded JEE-Main admit cards while over 10 lakh aspirants have downloaded NEET admit cards. This shows that students want the exams to be held at any cost,” Pokhriyal said.

“We have received mails from students and parents who are in favour of holding exams as they have been preparing for the exams from at least two-three years,” the minister added.

Earlier this week, several chief ministers and political leaders had written to the education minister and even to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking a reassessment of the dangers of forcing physical attendance of students in examination halls amid COVID-19 pandemic.

The National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) is scheduled to be held on September 13 and engineering entrance exam JEE-Main has been planned from September 1-6. Around 8.58 lakh candidates have registered for Joint Entrance Examination (JEE)–Main and 15.97 lakh students have registered for NEET.

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These exams have already been deferred twice in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

The JEE-Mains was originally scheduled to be held from April 7-11, but postponed to July 18-23, NEET-UG was originally scheduled for May 3, then pushed to July 26. They were postponed again and are now scheduled in September.

(With inputs from agencies)