Urdu-medium NEET to begin in 2018-19, rules SC
Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Centre to include Urdu as a language in the NEET exam, the common test for admission into medical courses, from academic session 2018-19 onwards.
A bench comprising justices Dipak Misra, A M Khanwilkar and M M Shantanagoudar told the petitioner, who has sought a direction for making Urdu as a medium for NEET 2017 scheduled on May 7, that it would not be possible for the government to include Urdu this year.
“We direct the Union of India to include Urdu as a language in NEET examination from academic session 2018-19 onwards,” the bench said.
When the counsel for the petitioner insisted that Urdu language should be included in NEET examination from this year itself, the bench said, “the whole problem is that this year it is not possible.”
“There are lots of difficulties. Please try to understand that we can’t ask them (Centre) to do miracles. The examination is on May 7 and today is April 13. Lots of process is involved in this,” the bench said.
Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar, appearing for the Centre, said that they were not opposed to the suggestion.
The solicitor general had on March 31 told the court that a students’ body seeking NEET examination in Urdu language has accused the Centre of being
Is the government attempting to control cut-offs for admissions to top institutes ?
This seems likely if a meeting called by HRD ministry of educations secretaries and chairman of state boards on April 24 is any indication. On the agenda is a review of the ‘moderation’ policy to award students extra marks for ‘difficult’ questions, said to be the reason behind inflated scores in boards — which in turn lead to high cut-offs. ››P9 communal.
The submission was made while referring to the affidavit filed by Students Islamic Organisation of India through its national secretary Thouseef Ahamad. The Centre had told the court it was not feasible to introduce Urdu as a medium in the current academic year.
At present, NEET is being conducted in 10 languages — Hindi, English, Gujarati, Marathi, Oriya, Bengali, Assamese, Telegu, Tamil and Kannada.
Barely a day after members of Hindu Yuva Vahini (HYV) allegedly thrashed a Muslim boy in Meerut while he was with his girlfriend, another couple was allegedly harassed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers on Wednesday night.
Police have arrested one of the accused in the case while two others named in the FIR are still at large.
“Of the three accused, one Ankit has been arrested on Thursday,” SP city Alok Priyadarshi said while confirming that an FIR had been lodged on the girl’s complaint.
The girl accused BJP workers of passing objectionable comments and lodged a complaint against Ankit, Sagar Poswal and Ankit’s brother, all said to be BJP supporters.
“The accused BJP men living in the neighbourhood of the girl had passed some objectionable comments at the couple, which resulted in a conflict that ended in a brawl,” the SP said.
The boy Harish had gone to pick up his fiancé along with his brother Avneesh on Wednesday night upon the request of the girl.
Some BJP supporters of the area passed objectionable comments, upon which Harish asked the girl to sit on his bike and dropped her home. When he was returning with his brother Avneesh, the group stopped them and thrashed the duo.
Locals reported the matter to the police who reached the spot and took the clashing youths to the nearby PVS Mall Chowki. Later the girl and her family members rushed to the police chowki to rescue the boys.