T.N. govt. hopeful of having its way on NEET

Though Governor R.N. Ravi is yet to clear the Bill adopted by the Assembly in September to scrap the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) as the sole gateway for admission to undergraduate medical courses, the DMK government is hopeful of having its way.

Sources say the government’s optimism stems from the major difference between a similar Bill of 2017, which was rejected by President Ram Nath Kovind in September that year, and the present one.

Unlike the former, the new Bill is based upon quantifiable data, as assessed by a committee led by A.K. Rajan, former judge of the Madras High Court, to study the impact of NEET on medical admissions.

The Bill also protects the horizontal reservation for government school students, a measure that is based on the findings of another committee, headed by Justice P. Kalaiyarasan, also a former High Court judge.

State better placed

Though the National Medical Commission Act, 2019, has a provision for NEET that goes against the latest Bill, as the previous Indian Medical Council Act did, the sources feel the State government is better placed than the Union government, as the subject — public health — is on the State List (Entry 6).

The Union government is expected to justify its stand on the ground that Entry 66 in the Union List — “co-ordination and determination of standards in institutions for higher education or research and scientific and technical institutions” — backs its position.

However, the State government says that the phrase, “determination of standards,” does not necessarily incorporate the meaning of holding a common test for regulating admissions.

The government is also banking on various judicial pronouncements, including the Supreme Court quashing, five months ago, certain features of the 97th Constitutional Amendment on cooperative institutions, citing the absence of ratification by half of the States.

In a majority judgment authored by Justice Rohinton Nariman, the court held that cooperative societies fell under the “exclusive legislative power” of the State legislatures. This can be stretched to cover the government’s position on NEET, the sources add.