Students seeking the postponement of NEET PG 2023 are yet to have clarity on the situation. Petitions demanding the exam be deferred by a few months were heard in the Supreme Court today, February 24, but a solution is yet to be gouged out.
The students state they do not have enough time to study as the exam was scheduled early in March. They also claim there is no point in conducting the exam so early when with the extension of the internship cut-off date by the National Board of Examinations (NBE), the counselling cannot start before August.
Senior Advocates Gopal Sankaranarayanan and Mukul Rastogi argued on behalf of the petitioners in front of a bench comprising Justices S Ravindra Bhat and Dipankar Datta. Sankaranarayanan submitted that though only 13 petitions had been filed, the issue affects 45,000 students across India. However, on coming to know that about 2 lakh candidates have registered for the exam, the bench pointed out that this number is that of a minority, as per a report by LiveLaw.
The issue involving the mandatory internship that NEET PG aspirants have to undergo was also discussed in the court. Sankaranarayanan said that the cut-off date was now extended to August 11. "These students are now undergoing over 12 hours of internship work daily and hence there is no adequate time for preparation," he said, urging the postponement.
But the bench expressed its concerns over such a move, and spoke of the agony of students who are already preparing for NEET PG. "Those who have been preparing for months together, if they are told that they should wait for months..... We are also aware when we postpone...the agony of candidates who have prepared...the whole dynamics changes," Justice Bhat said.
Later, the bench also told the petitioners that many of them were eligible only after the internship cut-off date was extended. "In normal course you had to wait for months. Now you have got a chance...and you want to defer the exam," Justice Bhat commented, as per LiveLaw.
Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, appearing on behalf of the NBE, spoke of the technical difficulty involved in the postponement of a national-level exam. "There is a technology partner whose services have been roped in to conduct the exams and if the exams are postponed, possible dates may not be available," she said.
Justice Bhat concluded that from a macro-perspective, the postponement seems very easy. "But it is not like that," he said. The bench categorically stated it is not passing any order either way and keeping the issue open till the next date of hearing, which is February 27, as per a tweet by LiveLaw. The court has also sought a response from the NBE and asked the body to come up with a solution.
