More than 100 writers and progressive thinkers have petitioned Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar, urging him to pass a resolution against the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) and the National Testing Agency (NTA) during the Monsoon Session of the legislature, which begins on Thursday. The petition has been signed by retired Supreme Court judge Justice Gopal Gowda, former Vice-Chancellor Sabiha Bhoomigowda, writer Mudnakudu Chinnaswamy, educationist Niranjanaradhya, and others.

“The NEET, made compulsory across the country for admission to medical education, is having serious effects on the federal principle of the Constitution, the educational autonomy of States, social justice and equal opportunity. Therefore, we, representatives of Karnataka’s civil society, unanimously urge that a resolution be passed in the upcoming Karnataka Legislative Session pressing the Union Government to cancel NEET and the NTA, and to return the policy and process of medical admissions to the States,” the petition stated.

“Education is a subject on which both the Centre and the States have legislative powers. But through Section 14 of the National Medical Commission Act, 2019, the compulsory uniform NEET has reduced the decisive authority of States in selecting students for medical education. In a country like India, with diverse curricula, languages, rural-urban inequalities and socio-economic variations, imposing a single exam as a uniform qualification does not achieve real equality,” they argued.

Further, they stated that NEET has diminished the importance of school education, reducing two years of a student’s continuous learning and effort to a single-day multiple-choice test. While it benefits students from urban areas and economically stronger families who can afford expensive coaching, it creates unequal competition for students from government schools, rural areas, Kannada-medium backgrounds and disadvantaged communities, they said.