SC notice to Centre, CBSE for inclusion of Urdu in NEET
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday issued a notice on a plea for conducting the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) for medical admissions in Urdu and sought the response of the Medical Council of India (MCI), Dental Council of India (DCI) and the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).
A Bench comprising justices Kurian Joseph and R Banumathi issued notice on a petition by the Student Islamic Organisation (SIO) which pleaded that Maharashtra and Telangana had already sought introduction of Urdu in NEET.
The Bench also noted the submission that the MCI was open to include any language as a medium of NEET, if a request was made to it by the states concerned.
NEET is currently being held in Hindi, English, Gujarati, Marathi, Odiya, Bengali, Assamese, Telugu, Tamil and Kannada.
The petitioner in his plea had challenged the alleged discrimination to the Urdu language by its non-inclusion in the exam and termed it as arbitrary, discriminatory and unreasonable and as such violating Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution.
“The decision to exclude Urdu which is the sixth most spoken language of India, while including seventh most spoken language Gujarati and twelfth most spoken language Assamese is completely without any rationale basis,” the plea said.
The counsel for SIO informed the court that Maharashtra and Telangana have already apprised the MCI that Urdu be included as one of the medium for conducting NEET.