(Bloomberg) – Premier Narendra Modi faces its first challenge after forming the government as a national entrance exam for admission to India’s medical colleges sparked outrage over allegations of corruption.
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About 2.4 million students took the exam this year to gain admission to more than 100,000 seats in state and private medical colleges. However, there were allegations of cheating and questionnaire leaks after an unusual number of high scores. The controversy has left hundreds of thousands of aspiring doctors uncertain about their future amid a severe jobs crisis.
The sudden increase in high scores is unnatural, says Alakh Pandey, founder and CEO of edtech company Physics Wallah. “Students have worked hard for this for years, sometimes needing gap years to make their dreams come true,” he said in an emailed statement. “This scam has not only crushed their morale but also discouraged their parents.”
On Thursday, the Supreme Court sought responses from the government and the National Testing Agency on petitions seeking scrapping of the 2024 exam and an inquiry, the Press Trust of India reported. The exam was held last month and the results were announced on June 4, the same day as the national polls, bringing Modi to power for a rare third term, albeit with a reduced majority.
In another entrance test, the results were canceled after investigations revealed that the exam paper was available on the ‘dark net’, Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said at a press conference on Thursday. The government will form a high-level committee to determine the appropriate testing process, he added.
Opposition parties have asked the government for clarification on allegations of leaking questionnaires, assessment irregularities and cheating. India’s main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, will protest on Friday and June 24, when Parliament will hold its first session after the formation of the new government. The Modi government denied all allegations and said it was “committed to ensuring the sanctity of examinations and protecting the interests of students,” a statement said.
The alleged scandal comes as the world’s most populous country struggles to provide enough jobs for its 1.4 billion people despite rapid growth. Although India is expected to grow by more than 7% this year – one of the fastest in the world – it is not creating enough jobs, a fact pointed out by opposition parties. A study shows that Asia’s third-largest economy needs to create 115 million jobs by 2030 as more people enter the labor market.
Under mounting pressure, the National Testing Agency canceled some students’ grades and announced plans for their resit exams on June 23. Police in the western state of Gujarat and the eastern state of Bihar have made a number of arrests in the case.
The government must keep the interests of all students in mind and is tackling isolated incidents of cheating, Pradhan said.
–With help from Shruti Srivastava, Swati Gupta and Vrishti Beniwal.
(Updates with government response in fifth and final paragraph.)
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