Chennai : Tamil Nadu’s ruling Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) on Tuesday reiterated its demand for the complete abolition of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET). As student protests over NEET continued in Delhi, the TVK said its stand on the issue remained “uncompromising and firm”, insisting that the national medical entrance examination should be scrapped.
The TVK took an apparent swipe at the opposition DMK without naming it, accusing it of engaging in “fraudulent politics” by making election promises to abolish NEET without delivering on them. Ahead of the 2021 Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, the DMK had pledged to scrap the examination if voted to power. The party proposed that if constitutional or legal hurdles delayed the transfer of education to the State List, the Centre should create a Special Concurrent List as an interim arrangement.
This is our vision for both a permanent and an interim solution. Our victorious leader, Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay, has already emphasised this,” the statement said. The TVK also criticised political parties that, it alleged, claimed credit for the ideas and struggles of others. It urged those indulging in such “unethical politics” to stop targeting the party. The statement comes amid a political row over the treatment of rapper ‘Therukkural’ Arivu, who has been vocal in opposing NEET.
Before being detained by police outside the Tamil Nadu Secretariat in Chennai’s Fort St George complex, Arivu briefly raised slogans demanding the abolition of the examination. Reiterating its position, the TVK said NEET should be scrapped and states must be granted complete control over education and medical education, describing the demand as central to its policy agenda.
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