BHUBANESWAR: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday demanded postponement of the JEE (Main) and NEET scheduled in the first fortnight of September for admission to technical and medical courses to a later date to ensure the safety and security of the students in view of the prevailing Covid-19 pandemic situation.
“I would like to say that in view of the prevailing Covid pandemic situation in the country, it would be highly unsafe and perilous for the students to visit the state centres physically to appear in these tests,” the Chief Minister said in a letter to Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.
The National Testing Agency (NTA) has scheduled to conduct the JEE (Main) and NEET 2020 tests on September 1-6 and September 13 respectively, the Chief Minister said and added that more than 50,000 students from Odisha are appearing in NEET and around 40,000 in JEE (Main) examination. However, the NTA has opened examination centres for the tests in seven towns only, he said.
The Chief Minister said that as frequent lockdown/shutdown is being enforced by the district administrations due to sudden escalation of Covid positive cases, local transportation has also got disrupted. Besides, Odisha has vast tribal pockets which are inaccessible and far away from the urban centres of the state. “As such, students of these areas may be deprived of appearing in these tests as they will have to travel long distances to reach the examination centres,” he said.
The Chief Minister also requested the Union Education Minister to direct the NTA that whenever it holds these tests to open centres in all the 30 districts so that students have to travel maximum two to three hours to reach the test centres and go back home the same day. Opening of test centres in all districts of the state will ensure maximum participation of the students in these tests, he said.