Recently, I had an encounter with a medical aspirant’s parent. He narrated his daughter’s story of how she prepared for the NEET and how the result spoilt her ambition of becoming a doctor. Consistent in her academic performance, the girl scored 492 out of 500 marks in her class X and 1092 out of 1200 in her class XII. She attended a one-month preparation course for the NEET in April 2018. Though the fee for the course was high and the course was not effective, she managed to get a score of 246 in the NEET. She knows that with her score she can’t get a seat in a government college as hundreds of students are ahead of her rank-wise. She can get a seat in a private medical college but her family is not in a position to spend ₹75 lakh to earn an MBBS degree. “It is unaffordable for us,” said her father. So, the idea of seeking admission in a private medical college is ruled out.
The medical aspirant wants to join a 10-month full-time residential coaching programme in a neighbouring state but the programme costs about ₹1,80,000. Her parents are reluctant again because they think that the fee is high and attending the course does not guarantee her a seat in a government medical college. “Is my daughter’s dream of becoming a doctor shattered?” asked the parent. There must be hundreds of such untold stories of academically brilliant students who cannot realise their aspirations. Who is responsible for scripting such stories? Education system? Parents? Students?
Entrance tests
Students seeking undergraduate admissions to Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and National Institutes of Technology (NITs) take national-level entrance test, the Joint Entrance Examination Advanced (JEE Advanced). Those seeking admission to undergraduate medical (MBBS) and dental (BDS) courses take the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET). Ever since the results of JEE Main, JEE Advanced and NEET were declared, there have been scores of full-page colourful advertisements with the photographs of toppers in leading newspapers across the country. Obviously, the purpose of the advertisers is to showcase their achievements of having produced toppers in the highly competitive exams. One coaching academy through its advertisement claims that it has produced 66 of top 100 rankers in JEE Advanced. Another coaching academy claims that its success rate is much higher than any other coaching institute in the country. The message conveyed indirectly is that without attending classes in top coaching academies it is not possible to secure ranks or even crack these exams.
Many advertisements carried testimonials of NEET and JEE Advanced toppers. According to the testimonials, some toppers prepared for the IIT JEE for 2 - 6 years. One of the toppers states that if he had not attended coaching classes at a particular institute he would not have secured a rank and he advises others IIT aspirants to join the institute.
Another student says that he was an average student but with the coaching he had at an institute for four years he was able to get a rank. Yet another student claims that it was because he started preparing for JEE from his class VIII he could come off with flying colours. Again the message implied by those testimonials was “If you don’t attend coaching, you won’t succeed”.
How much does the coaching cost? Some institutions charge over ₹2 lakh for a two-year preparation programme for JEE coaching. Besides attending schools 5-6 days a week, IIT aspirants spend one full day (Sunday) or two days (Saturday and Sunday) every week attending coaching classes and taking tests. Some elite schools in cities offer their students JEE and NEET coaching by having a tie-up with coaching institutions.
In such schools the average cost for each student is around ₹1,50,000. In April, various schools and coaching institutions offered 4-week NEET preparation courses and the fees varied between ₹15,000 and ₹60,000. Can academically brilliant but economically poor students afford such expensive coaching for these tough competitive exams? If the answer is “No”, is it fair to deny them admissions in top-notch institutions such as IITs, NITs and government medical colleges? Should the underprivileged be denied their right to become doctors?
Super30
Anand Kumar of Super30 has been successfully running a programme of preparing 30 underprivileged children for the JEE every year. In 2018, 26 students of the 30 selected cracked the JEE. The fact that Super 30 has successfully sent many underprivileged students to IITs proves that given an opportunity, economically backward but academically meritorious students can shine like other privileged ones.
In India where there is no uniform education system, JEE Main, JEE Advanced and NEET are unfair and unjust academic competitions. When the country fails to provide quality education and does not prepare the underprivileged students to compete with the privileged ones in such tough entrance tests, many brilliant minds will continue to be denied justice.
The author is an academic, columnist and freelance writer. rayanal@yahoo.co.uk
