The National Medical announced today, July 13 that the National Exit Test (NExT) would be deferred for the current final year MBBS students, that is, the batch of 2019, in the form of an official notice.
The notice reads, “All the stakeholders are hereby informed that the National Exit Test (NExT) examination is deferred on the advice of the Ministry dated 11. 07. 2023, till further directions from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.”
Following this announcement, doctors and medical students have taken to Twitter to react to it. The 2019 batch of students, who had been protesting against the exam for the last two weeks, expressed jubilation and breathed a sigh of collective relief over the news.
Some doctors even congratulated the medical student community on their collective unity and acknowledged the work done by students, doctors and doctors’ associations. They even termed this moment as “historic”.
However, not all reactions to this news have been positive – as people are pointing out the lack of clarification from the NMC on various other aspects of the exam, like the time period of its deferral.
A lot of people, while welcoming the decision, were also of the opinion that the NExT exam had scope for a lot of improvement.
Some even questioned the validity of the move to have a centralised exit exam for the whole country.
However, leaders from the medical community have clarified that the 2019 batch of MBBS students do not have to appear for NExT.
To recap, the NMC announced the NExT exam through a webinar on June 27. Following this, there was a heavy backlash from students from the 2019 batch on Twitter, which eventually translated to on-ground, non-violent protests.
