CHENNAI: Despite an improvement of 9.01 per cent in the number of students from Tamil Nadu clearing the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) undergraduate examinations this year, none has secured a rank in the top 50.
According to results of the test, conducted on May 5 and announced on Wednesday, 48.57 per cent of students from TN who took the exam qualified this year compared to 39.56 per cent in 2018. TN has bitterly opposed the test since its introduction.
K Shruthi, a student at a private school in Tiruvallur district, secured the 57th All India Rank (AIR) by scoring 685 out of 720. She secured a percentile of 99.9949672. She came 10th among all female candidates. KK Karvanna Prabu, another candidate from the State, secured the fifth rank in the physically handicapped category. His NEET AIR is 15,623.
Among all States and Union Territories, Tamil Nadu is 23rd in terms of percentage of students qualifying in NEET, an improvement from last year when it was in the bottom five.
A total of 1,38,997 students registered for the test from the State this year but 15,919 students did not appear for the exam, leaving TN with the highest number of absentees in the country. Of the 1,23,078 candidates who took the exam, 59,785 cleared it. In 2018, around 1.14 lakh candidates took the exam and 45,336 cleared it.