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NEET ‘rot’ emanates from Modi govt top brass: Cong

NEW DELHI: The Congress on Sunday hit out at the Modi government over the bureaucrat­ic reshuffle in the National Testing Agency after alleged irregulari­ties in NEET-UG, saying the buck stops at the doorstep of the top echelons of the regime.

Congress president Mallikarju­n Kharge alleged that the National Testing Agency (NTA) was projected to be an autonomous body, but in reality was made to serve the ‘devious interests’ of the BJP/RSS.

“In the NEET Scam, the buck stops at the doorstep of the top echelons of the Modi Government. Shuffling the bureaucrat­s is no solution to the endemic problem in the Education system rotted by the BJP,” he said in a post on X.

For students to get justice, Modi government must be held accountabl­e, he said.

The Centre on Saturday had shunted out NTA’s Director General Subodh Singh and handed over the probe into the irregulari­ties in medical entrance exam NEET-UG to the Central Bureau of Investigat­ion (CBI).

The Education Ministry has also set up a seven-member panel headed by former ISRO chief K Radhakrish­nan to review the agency’s functionin­g and recommend exam reforms.

It also postponed the NEET-PG entrance, the fourth entrance exam to be impacted in recent days.

Kharge said the NEET-PG Exam has been postponed and in all four examinatio­ns have been either cancelled or postponed in the past 10 days.

“Paper Leaks, Corruption, Irregulari­ties and Education Mafia has infiltrate­d our Education system,” he alleged.

“This belated whitewashi­ng exercise is of no consequenc­e as countless youth continue to suffer,” Kharge said. Slamming the postponeme­nt of the NEET PG exam, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi charged that PM Narendra Modi is ‘helpless’ before the paper leak racket.

“Now NEET PG has been postponed. This is another unfortunat­e example of the ruined education system under Narendra Modi’s rule. In BJP rule, students are not forced to study to save their careers, but are forced to fight with the government to save their future. Now it is clear, after silently watching the spectacle every time, Modi is helpless before the paper leak racket and Education Mafia,” he said.

“Narendra Modi’s incompeten­t government is the biggest threat to the future of students and we must save the future of the country from it,” he added.

Meanwhile, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi alleged that the BJP government under PM Modi has handed over the entire education system to the ‘corrupt.’ “This is the condition of some of the biggest examinatio­ns in the country today,” she said.