LG, Delhi government at odds again, this time over NEET

NEW DELHI: The AAP government and the lieutenant governor have once again locked horns, this time over conducting the Joint Entrance Exam and the National Eligibility Entrance Test. LG Anil Baijal has rejected a Delhi government proposal requesting him to not allow the JEE and NEET in the national capital. The AAP government is opposed to conducting the competitive examinations, which, it believes, may expose candidates to the risk of getting infected by the novel coronavirus.
According to a Delhi government source, Baijal has rejected the proposal and returned the file to the elected government. “The file was sent to the LG, highlighting the risk of Covid-19 while conducting the examinations,” said the sources. The government also underlined that maintaining social distancing among the candidates outside the test centres would be a challenging affair, increasing the risk. It is likely that the Delhi Disaster Management Authority may permit holding the examination in the capital.
Recently, Delhi’s education minister Manish Sisodia asked the Centre to reconsider its decision of holding the exams in the prevailing pandemic. Sisodia urged the central government to either postpone the tests or find an alternative way of conducting them.
“The Centre has closed its eyes to the Covid-19 ground reality. Why is it forcing 28 lakh students to sit for the exams? They are saying they will make all the necessary arrangements. But despite the arrangements till now, so many people have tested positive,” Sisodia recently said on the Centre’s decision to hold the examinations.
In a letter to education minister Ramesh Rokhriyal Nishank, Sisodia recently stated, “We have to accept that the country is still in the grip of corona. In Delhi and a few other states, situation may be better, but in other states, cases of infection by Covid-19 are on the rise.”