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  Opinion   Edit  19 Aug 2020  AA Edit | Let the students skip JEE for their own good

AA Edit | Let the students skip JEE for their own good

THE ASIAN AGE.
Published : Aug 19, 2020, 5:12 pm IST
Updated : Aug 19, 2020, 5:12 pm IST

In these unprecedented circumstances of a Covid year, should not the health of their children have been the parents' priority?

While 17 lakh students have registered for NEET, 11 lakh youngsters will be writing the JEE
 While 17 lakh students have registered for NEET, 11 lakh youngsters will be writing the JEE

With the Supreme Court's indiscriminate status quo on the JEE and NEET entrances taking effect, a logistical nightmare stares at the authorities. Parents are happy that their children will not "lose" a year and will be availing of the best opportunities.

They forget that the rules of both the NEET and JEE allow students to take it multiple times and it is commonplace for many to give up a year anyway in order to take it twice.

In these unprecedented circumstances of a Covid year, should not the health of their children have been the parents' priority? But then, the deadly virus has so far only been known to hit other people. Denial is comforting.

So the governments at the centre and in the states must now be seen working to ensure that the examinations do not become another source of the spread. For this, they have to plumb the best practices from around the world and then adapt them here.

Sadly, given our high population and low per capita income leading to anxiety for our children's future financial security, the emphasis on a job-oriented STEM education is paramount leading to a manic make-or-break college entrance system unparalleled in the world.

Hence not many examples of these practices exist. While 17 lakh students have registered for NEET, 11 lakh youngsters will be writing the JEE. Only a limited number of exam centres are present in a state. Not every district has an exam centre.

The students will be accompanied by their parents on these outstation trips where they will arrange for overnight stays in hotels and at relatives' places, rising infection chances.

As far as holding of exams is concerned, so far it has been seen that the level of precautions taken and screening done at centres are dismal. The World Health Organisation now holds that the coronavirus is airborne. Patients, too, may be asymptomatic.

Asymptomatic patients will inevitably be seated in the exam hall next to uninfected for three hours.

More alarmingly, there will be cases of students coming to take the exam with a light fever, sparked by stress or common cold, and they will be made to take the exam in isolation alongside those who may be having the virus.

An online exam would have solved this crisis, but neither the government nor the court displayed the requisite pro-activity. The only option that remains now is for parents, themselves, to let their child skip the exam.

The government, which can still step in, is unlikely to, seeing as it has consistently opposed the entrance postponements.

So that relief is available to all, 11 students from various parts of the country had moved a petition in the Supreme Court.
But god forbid, if the student "wastes" their year frivolously, studying science or engineering/medicine in less prestigious colleges and institutes or, in the worst case scenario, in pursuits other than the most heavy-duty academics.

"These students are all 21-22-year-olds. Can you believe they will not be going out," solicitor general Tushar Mehta submitted before the court. It had also cited, not so accurately, that the entire country is "working".

The court, therefore, in its uncontested wisdom, declined the students' prayer. After all, is there a precedent that the esteemed Indian judiciary took into account a child's argument?

Even if, in the process, it has jeopardised the child's right to health and their right to life. For their own good.

Tags: jee entrance exam