DMK Is Wrong : NEET 2021 Results Reiterate Social Justice

 

Almost all the major political parties in Tamil Nadu with the exception of BJP, particularly the DMK, remain consistent in their opposition to NEET. They object to it because, in their opinion, there is lack of social justice in NEET. DMK has become vehement in its opposition after it came to power in 2021, as one of its poll promises was the abolition of NEET. So it passed resolutions twice in the assembly to that effect and sent them to the Governor. Now the DMK wants the Governor to send the resolution to the President of India.  

When the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu submitted a list of demands to the Prime Minister in Delhi recently, it included the removal of NEET for the medical admissions in the state. Besides their MPs have also raised this issue in the Parliament.

But the argument of the DMK and the supporting parties are completely wrong. NEET has been repeatedly ensuring social justice year after year, enabling the students from the socially and economically disadvantaged sections to get a higher number of seats, like never before in the history of Tamil Nadu.

An analysis of the allotment of seats in the state medical colleges for 2020                   ( Swarajya, June 2021) showed as to how the students belonging to the backward, most backward and scheduled castes were able to get much higher proportion of seats than their allotted quotas as per the state reservation policy. It revealed that the students from those  sections, that the DMK claims it is fighting for, have benefited hugely after the introduction of NEET. The allotment details for the Government school students in the state medical colleges under the 7.5 per cent reservation for 2021 again confirmed the above trend. ( Swarajya, Feb 2022)

The latest allocation details for 2021 for all the medical and dental seats under the state quota released by the Tamil Nadu Government again establishes that there is ample social justice in medical admissions in the state, that was absent before the introduction of NEET. The Table below provides the caste wise seat allocation data after the first round of results in February 2022.

 

 

 

Table -  Tamil Nadu MBBS/ BDS Counselling 2021: 1^st Round Results- Seat Allocation – Caste-wise

Community	Govt. Medical Colleges	Allocation of Seats %	Self- Finance Medical Colleges	Govt. Dental Colleges	Self- Finance Dental Colleges	7.5% Reservation seats	Special Category	Total	Allocation %
Forward Caste	102	2.60	103	6	29	3	1	244	3.36
Backward Caste	1867	47.52	679	83	557	211	40	3437	47.38
Backward Caste - Muslim	187	4.76	50	6	69	24	6	342	4.71
Most Backward Caste	1005	25.58	277	30	312	190	20	1834	25.28
Scheduled Caste	611	15.55	206	24	180	89	6	1116	15.38
Scheduled Caste - Arunthathiar	117	2.98	40	4	34	14		209	2.88
Scheduled Tribe	40	1.02	14	2	12	4		72	0.99
Total	3929		1369	155	1193	535	73	7254

 Source: MBBS Counselling Round 1 and Extension Results, Govt. of Tamil Nadu

 

The above figures reveal that the students from the families belonging to the BC, MBC, SC and STs have got more than 96 per cent of the medical and dental seats for the latest year.  Hence there is no truth in the argument of DMK and its supporters that there is no social justice in NEET. It is only after the introduction of NEET that such a high number of students from the poorer BC, MBC and SC categories have been entering the medical and dental colleges.

Besides, 535 students from the Government schools have been allotted seats in the medical and dental colleges this time. So their another argument that the students from the Government schools do not get admissions into medical colleges is again proved wrong.

Moreover, the number of students who have got seats in the All India premier institutions such as the AIIMS and JIPMER have been increasing and are higher this year. The results (first round) of the Medical Counselling Committee, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt. of India show that 46 students from the state have got admissions in different institutions under the All India Institute of Medical Sciences. It is important to note that 40 per cent of the seats (20 out of 50 seats) in AIIMS, Madurai have been taken by the Tamil Nadu students in its first year of functioning.  

In the case of JIPMER, Pondicherry, a record number of 32 seats have been taken up by the students from Tamil Nadu. It is more than one-fourth of the 121 seats coming under the general competition, after fulfilling the quotas under the state, NRI and EWS seats.  Besides, Tamil Nadu students have got four out of the first ten seats there. So the opportunities for the TN students to enter into the premier medical institutions outside the state have increased manifold and as a result, more students are joining such institutions.

Critics of NEET like DMK note that the Tamil medium students do not get the opportunity to get medical seats under the present system. In this connection, it is significant to note that an increasing number of students from the Tamil medium are opting for NEET. This can be understood when we see that above 17,000 students have written NEET in Tamil during 2021, which is around 15 per cent of the total students who took the examination.

So the results for 2021 NEET further reiterate that it is the students from the socially and economically poorer and the disadvantaged sections who have been   benefiting through this system. Hence all the arguments of the DMK and its supporters are completely wrong. The latest results also disprove the biased opinions of the Rajan Committee Report that formed the basis for rejection of NEET by the DMK Government.

It is clear that the opposition of the DMK to the NEET is not based on facts, but is kept alive only for the political reasons.

( Swarajya, Ap. 9,2022)