Not so NEET: Colleges block seats, sell to low rank holders

NEWDELHI: A section of candidates with high scores in the National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) colluded with private colleges to block seats till the last minute, allowing the institutes to sell the seats to low rank holders, an HT investigation has found.

An all-India examination for admission to medical and dental colleges, NEET replaced a clutch of separate entrance exams in 2016. The scam has come to light years after the exam-rigging scandal in Madhya Pradesh, commonly known as the Vyapam scam, which saw a racket of touts, officials and candidates rig entrance tests to medical colleges between 2004 and 2013.

In the scam, HT found the highscoring candidates blocked the seats in the initial counselling rounds and withdrew in the last minute so that the colleges could trade the vacancies for money.

Private colleges in at least three states — Bihar, Karnataka and Puducherry — might be been involved in the corrupt practice, commission agents told HT. And this is how they did it. A high rank holder, who has taken admission in another state, say Uttar Pradesh, went to Bihar, appeared for counselling and blocked a seat.

“We acted as a mediator between the college and some of the high rank holders. The deal varied between ~5 lakh to ~20 lakh depending upon the colleges,” an agent said.

After the initial counselling rounds, a Supreme Court directive allows the designated authorities to provide a list of candidates in the order of merit to the colleges in the ratio 1:10, which means a list containing ten times more candidates than vacant seats.

“When it went to the college level, the high rank holders withdrew their claims increasing the vacancy and giving opportunities to colleges to use its own discretion,” the agent added.

Colleges gave seats even to candidates outside the list provided by the counselling authorities. Prabhat Kumar, director of medical education in Bihar, admitted to the goings on.

“We asked candidates to deposit demand drafts in the name of the colleges. Perhaps that allowed candidate to collude with colleges to block seats,” says Kumar.

“The last-minute vacancy trend shows that seats were blocked. We will take steps to prevent that next time.”