If you'd thrown away your NEET ranking in disgust after the TN Government announced that they were deferring NEET by a year using a special ordinance, it's time to go look in the trash. The Supreme Court declared that the ordinance could not be passed and has reportedly termed it 'unfair' — a verdict that has come as a jolt to the Health and Family Welfare department of the TN Government who have lobbied for this exemption since time immemorial.
Counselling is likely to start as early as August 24 so that the 3000 plus medical seats in TN can be filled in time for classes to begin by end-September. However, sources in the Health Department have indicated that the counselling could be pushed to September 4, as there is no clarity at this point in time.
TN Health Secretary Dr J Radhakrishnan, who has been in New Delhi for the past few days to get the ordinance passed, confirmed the news and said that "the judgement had gone against them," and they would give an official reaction soon. The SC judgement came on the heels of the Attorney-General's rather pointed remarks that the move to pass such an ordinance would not stand up to "legal scrutiny" as per the provisions of the Constitution.
While the TN government has resolutely fought tooth and nail to gain exemption from NEET — a move that is seen as populist as most of the students studying under the TN State Board would not qualify to study medicine as their NEET scores were poor — this may be the end of the road. They're out of moves effectively and further appeals appear to be out of the question.
CBSE students and those who had taken a gap year to prep for NEET and had done reasonably well have welcomed the move, while others who had relied on state board or XIIth standard marks alone are, once again, left in a familiar lurch.
