Scrap NTA, hold Education Minister accountable: Yechury on NEET controversy

Amid the controversy surrounding entrance examinations conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA), general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Sitaram Yechury, on Thursday said the testing agency should be scrapped and the Union Education Minister be held responsible for the alleged irregularities.

“The National Testing Agency, set up by the University Grants Commission, has failed to do its job or is deliberating allowing this sort of anarchy to spread in education,” Mr. Yechury said here on Thursday. He said the alleged irregularities are linked to the Narendra Modi government’s plans “to destroy and revamp the education system only to propagate the Hindutva agenda.”

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“Thousands and thousands of our children have spent so much energy and time for these exams, and this is how they are being dealt with. They are the future of India. This is not acceptable,” Mr. Yechury said. “The Minister for education must be held accountable. For 10 years, no minister was held accountable for anything.”

The NTA has come under fire after candidates raised concerns surrounding alleged paper leaks and irregularities in the marking system of National Eligibility-Cum-Entrance Test (NEET). On Wednesday, the Ministry cancelled the UGC-NET examination, held earlier this month, saying the “integrity of the examination may have been compromised”. Opposition parties have since expressed concerns over the NTA and the process in which it conducts examinations.

Mr. Yechury said that as an Opposition party in the Lok Sabha, the CPI(M) will corner the Centre on their concerns. “The NDA alliance has got a razor thin majority of 20 seats in Parliament… This will mean there will be a lot of pressure put on the Modi government for its acts of omissions and commissions, of which NEET is a primary example.”

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Talking about the performance of the Left parties in the Lok Sabha election, Mr. Yechury, who addressed a press conference in the city, said the CPI(M) will break the Trinamool-BJP binary in West Bengal by continuing to fight for the people’s rights and livelihood. “In Bengal, our party campaigned very well, irrespective of what the results were. Owing to our young leaders, a new kind of party is being formed in Bengal, which will benefit both the State as well as the country,” he said.

The CPI(M) drew a blank in the election.