Over the past two weeks, the 2019 batch of medical students in India have been protesting and expressing their discontent and dissatisfaction against the newly-announced National Exit Text (NExT). Students from other batches have also joined in.
The All India Democratic Students’ Organisation (AIDSO), on June 29, had announced a week-long protest from July 1-7 in all medical colleges of India, demanding the repeal of the NExT exam. Apart from that, students, mentors and thought leaders in the medical and medical education community have also called for peaceful protests, asking the government to provide more clarity and time to the students regarding the exam.
In the past week alone, the 2019 batch of students from medical colleges such as Baba Raghav Das (BRD) Medical College, Gorakhpur; North Bengal Medical College and Hospital, Siliguri; Agartala Government Medical College, Agartala; Pacific Institute of Medical Sciences, Udaipur; Institute of Medical Sciences and Sum Hospital, Bhubaneswar, and many other medical colleges staged demonstrations and protests against the announcement.
Background
The NExT was originally prescribed in Section 15(1) of the National Medical Commission (NMC) Act, 2019. After years of uncertainty and lack of discussion, the exam was officially launched by the NMC on June 27, through a 50-minute webinar chaired by NMC Chairperson Dr Suresh Chandra Sharma.
In the webinar, it was informed that the NExT would be held in two levels – Step 1 and Step 2 and that Step 1 would take place twice a year in May and November. Further, students were informed that the 2019 batch of final-year students would be the first to appear for the exam and that a mock test would be held in July.
NExT is also supposed to streamline MBBS final exams, National Entrance-cum-Eligibility Test for Postgraduate (NEET PG) exam and the Foreign Medical Graduate Examination (FMGE).
The webinar was conducted with the aim of assuaging fears and anxieties regarding the exam. However, it seemed to have done the opposite – and left students with more questions than answers.
Students took to Twitter to voice out their confusion and demanded more clarity from the NMC. Some even spoke out against NExT being announced and conducted at such short notice and demanded that the exam be cancelled for their batch.
Eventually, this online dissent cascaded into on-ground protests and organising against the exam.
Grievances of the students
Speaking to EdexLive, Dr Dhruv Chauhan, Health Activist and National Zonal Coordinator of the Indian Medical Association - Medical Students Network (IMA-MSN), stated that many medical students from the 2019 batch have been sharing their concerns regarding the NExT with him.
“Their primary concern is the lack of clarity on when Step 1 would actually be held. The NMC has not clarified whether it would be conducted in November this year, or in May 2024. The students seek more clarity on this,” he said.
Secondly, the students also take issue with the minimum pass percentage of the NExT exam. “In NEET-UG and NEET-PG, the pass percentage is somewhere around 37.5%. However, the minimum pass percentage for NExT is capped at 50%,” says Chauhan, adding that the students are against this as it decreases their probability of qualifying.
Thirdly, there has also been a lot of contention with regard to the paper pattern of the NExT exam. Chauhan says, “All this time, the exams were subjective and theoretical. Students have become accustomed to that. All of a sudden, towards the end of their course, they are told that their final examination would be a computer-based Multiple Choice Question (MCQ) paper. Students find this shift very jarring.” He also adds that students are protesting the fact that they have to prepare for a whole new exam paper at such short notice.
There has also been no clarity about negative marking, Chauhan says. “Students have been told that the mock tests would have negative marking, while the official gazette notification for the NExT does not mention this for the main exam,” he adds.
“Overall, students have been protesting against the late announcement, and how this leaves them with no time to prepare for the exam properly. Students also demand more clarity on when and how the exam would be conducted,” says Chauhan. He says that ideally, the NMC must not conduct the exam before their term ends.
Response and future action
Amidst the protests, the Ministry of Health, Government of India has told the NMC to reduce the fees of the mock test, which stands at Rs 2,000 currently. However, there has been no response to this from the NMC.
The AIDSO, on its part, announced that it would hold a protest in front of the NMC Office in Delhi. The organisation would also submit a memorandum to the NMC, stating the demands of the protesting students.
