After the government's decision to go ahead with the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) and National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) amid the COVID-19 pandemic amid large-scale protests across the world, Bollywood actor Sonu Sood on Friday assured that he will help students from flood-hit states in the country travel to their respective examination centres.
Students, politicians, parents and others have raised their voice against the government's decision to conduct the exams despite the increasing cases of the Coronavirus in India. Several students have also pointed out that due to lockdowns still in place in certain areas and severe flooding in several states, it will be extremely difficult for them to find public transport to reach the exam centres.
Sonu Sood, who had also saught postponement, reacted to a video on Twitter of a student talking about not having funds to travel to the examination centre, amid the strain of the COVID-19 pandemic and continued threat. The actor wrote that he is willing to help all those students who are stuck in flood-hit regions of Bihar, Assam and Gujarat. The Bollywood actor tweeted that he is ready to make travel arrangements for them to reach the centres, urging the students to inform him about the areas of travel. He added that no one should be missing the exams for the lack of resources.
Sonu has already been hailed hero during the COVID-19 pandemic, as he arranged buses, trains and flights to help migrant workers and other stranded persons head back to their hometowns amid the consequent lockdowns. He had earlier said "The maximum students are from Bihar where 13 to 14 districts are badly hit by the floods. How can you expect them to travel? They don't have money or places to stay. We cannot force these students to come out and give these exams."
"Give them a window of two months. We need to postpone the exams till November-December. Students can take the exams when they are mentally prepared," he had stated seeking a postponement. "I am also an engineer. I believe that it is very important for the country to have a new breed of these young people who are going to take over a lot of departments," he added.
While the NEET is scheduled to be held on September 13, engineering entrance exam JEE Main is scheduled from September 1-6. Around 9.53 lakh candidates have registered for JEE-Mains and 15.97 lakh students have registered for NEET. The examination dates have already been altered twice due to the ongoing crisis and the subsequent lockdown. JEE-Main was originally supposed to be held from April 7-11 but got postponed to July 18-23, NEET-UG was originally scheduled for May 3, then was pushed to July 26. They were postponed again and are now scheduled in September.
