The NEET re-test is over, but the complaints from aspirants continue. The system is already under tremendous pressure, and paper leaks are common. The government’s push for a centralised selection system has also contributed to the multi-billion-dollar coaching industry, and perhaps this industry is the only entity that is benefiting from this madness.
It is estimated that nearly 100 students have committed suicide or died due to excessive peer and parental pressure related to the NEET exam over the last six years. This year’s fiasco has claimed nearly 16 lives so far. It is perplexing to fathom this obsession of Indian parents to get their wards to crack the impossibly tough competitive examination. If a student is genuinely interested in becoming a doctor, it is a different matter. Most of the students attempt the examination due to peer and parental pressure. As professions go, on average, a doctor’s earnings are not much to speak of. Unless someone has the urge to serve humanity through this noble profession, it makes no sense to choose this as one’s way of making a living.
The issue is that most families treat their children becoming a doctor as the ultimate social insurance policy. This shifts the motivation from an academic choice to a family rescue mission, introducing severe multi-generational guilt. At coaching hubs like Kota, students are systematically stripped of individuality. They are divided into batches based on weekly test ranks. They rob children of their childhood. Around 22.8 lakh students write the NEET examination for around 1.28 lakh undergraduate seats. The ratio is brutal. One of the biggest myths that is spread is the lack of sufficient number of doctors in India. The fact is that there is no shortage of doctors in India. We have a doctor to population ratio of 1:811 which exceeds the WHO recommendation of 1:1,000. The real issue is with the distribution.
Now, when we have this excess supply of doctors, with most of them concentrating in urban areas where there are more hospitals, the supply demand ratio becomes extremely unfavourable to the doctors.
Just for the bragging right of one’s child studying for medicine, no loving parent should force their children into the ‘coaching factories’ that promise to help them crack this crazily competitive examination. The tragic reality of student suicides, which prompted government-mandated “anti-suicide nets” in hostels and strict district guidelines, points to a sinister reality. When a student’s entire worth is tied to a four-option multiple-choice question, failing the exam feels equivalent to ending their life’s utility. Answering a few multiple choice questions in a limited period of time successfully doesn’t prove your DNAs have Einstein level intelligence nor does the failure proves their worthlessness.
The parents who stake everything to make their wards doctors, should enquire about the average income of graduate doctors who serve in their local hospitals. They should check how much an average dentist makes in their town. Not of the highly successful odd ones who have built their practice over decades of dedication, but those in their 20s and 30s. There is already an oversupply of doctors in many urban areas. Unless your son or daughter is deeply passionate about medicine—driven by a genuine desire to heal and help people, rather than by expectations of prestige or financial success—it is worth thinking carefully before steering them toward this profession. Medicine demands years of intense study, personal sacrifice, and resilience, often with financial rewards that may not justify the hardships involved. Without a strong intrinsic calling, it may not be fair to ask a teenager to spend some of the best years of their life pursuing such a demanding path.
When the results come, one out of 22 aspirants are going to be disappointed. Even among those who manage to crack it, only a few are going to get the college and branch of study of their choice. If any parent or grandparent is reading this, my suggestion would be to look beyond the immediate frenzy of percentiles, optical mark recognition sheets, and answer keys. The true crisis of NEET is not merely an administrative failure; it is a profound crisis of parental imagination. A multi-billion-dollar coaching industry has successfully convinced an entire generation that a teenager’s human worth can be compressed into a single afternoon’s evaluation. When an entire childhood is bartered for the mathematical lottery of a medical seat, families lose the very purpose of why they raise children. Your home must stand as a sanctuary from the world’s relentless ranking systems. If the coaching factories systematically strip away your child’s individuality, your responsibility is to fiercely restore it.
No professional prefix next to a name is worth the cost of a shattered youth or a life cut tragically short. Long after the news cycles about paper leaks and institutional fiascos fade, the emotional scars of this pressure cooker remain deep within families. When the dust settles on this exam cycle, look closely at your teenager. They are a complex human being, not a collection of multiple-choice answers. Be the guiding voice that measures success by their wholeness, their curiosity, and their capacity to bounce back from failure. Choose their long-term wellbeing over fleeting societal prestige. Protect their best years, embrace their unique trajectory, and give them the most powerful gift a parent can offer: the unconditional permission to discover who they are on their own terms.
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