TIRUCHY: While many medical aspirants claimed the NEET exam was moderately easy, the day was not at all easy. From having to go without food for six hours straight to waiting in queue for what seemed like an eternity, candidates and parents were put to the test on Sunday.
To ensure social distancing, several arrangements, including placing of barricades, were made. Despite coordinators and police strictly enforcing the norms, parents and candidates said claimed that it made matters worse.
For instance, students had to come in batches. Some had to come as early as 11 am for the 2 pm exam so that there is no bottling of students at the entrance. And after every 40 minutes more batches could enter the centres.
However, many candidates came much earlier, but they were not allowed inside and due to this candidates and parents crowded up outside the centres. The bigger issue; however, was non-availability of food. To ensure social distancing, no canteens or eateries were allowed to operate within the campus.
Due to this, candidates who entered the centres earlier were forced to go without food for a long period of time. Even if they finished the exam early, the candidates were not allowed to leave and had to wait till 5 pm to exit.
Exam easier than last year?
Many students felt that the paper was not very hard to crack. M Harish, for whom this was a second attempt told TNIE, "The paper was not as tough as last time. Biology part was particularly easy for me, while physics was bit of a challenge, but not very tough."
Mohana Dhanalakshmi from Nagamangalam echoed his views. "Physics part was more challenging than chemistry and biology was very easy. I also did put in more effort for biology."
T Rakshan threw light on why most felt physics was a bit difficult. "Physics part had more calculations from unexpected subjects. For example, in atomic physics one would mostly expect theoritical questions, but we had arithmetic questions there. This took me by surprise."