The Madras High Court on Tuesday urged the TN govt. about its decision to form a committee for NEET. It also included whether it had sought permission from the SC and whether the action would violate the uppermost court ruling.
The ruling party DMK has promised to repeal the NEET and has recently formed a high-level committee led by retired Madras High Court judge AK Rajan. The committee would investigate the impact of NEET on aspirants from the socially disadvantaged sections in medical admissions.
“Have you obtained the Supreme Court’s permission? (which had upheld the NEET). Isn’t that a violation of the Supreme Court’s decision?” was the question raised by the first bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy.
The court made its remarks after BJP State General Secretary came up for a hearing today for his PIL. The formation of the panel appears to be a losing battle since the Supreme Court has made it clear that Tamil Nadu must follow suit and embrace NEET. The Chief justice observed, that the state administration must have acquired the top court’s permission before constituting the panel.
The formation of the committee, according to Advocate-General R Shanmugasundaram, was a policy choice made by the state govt. As per the electoral promise to protect the interests of underprivileged students in rural areas. The appeal sought to invalidate a Secretary of Health and Family Welfare (MCA-1) department’s directive on the commission’s formation on June 10.
It claimed that it was ‘unconstitutional, illegal, unfair, and without legal reason.’ The petitioner claimed, that the state government’s ruling violated the procedure objectives of the National Medical Commission Act of 2019.
It was not allowed to the state administration to provide an alternative when the SC ordered it to apply NEET by ruling dated August 22, 2017. When Chief Minister M K Stalin announced the panel earlier this month, he said it would look into whether NEET had an adverse effect on students from backward classes, and if it did, the committee would make recommendations to the government.
NEET is opposed by almost all political parties in the state, including the BJP’s ally AIADMK, despite the fact that a few medical aspirants have allegedly committed suicide over the issue, either as a result of a poor test score, as in the case of S Anitha of Ariyalur, or due to anxiety about the qualifying exam.
