Anxiety grips parents as wards give NEET

Gopalapuram has been abuzz ever since the announcement of candidates and launching of election campaigns, but Sunday morning saw visitors of another kind. Hundreds of parents, who had made an overnight journey to Chennai, were sitting on the pavements of Second Street and Lloyds Road where the DAV Boys Senior Secondary School is located, their baggage strewn around them, waiting for their wards to emerge from the NEET, an entrance test for admission into medical colleges, which was being held at the school premises. 

Some had come early, anticipating a long wait. Anxiety was writ large on everybody’s face. A few people discussed the possibility of visiting the Mylapore temple, where a consecration had taken place recently, to pray for their children’s success; others, who were clearly in the city for the first time, thought of doing the touristy thing and went looking for Kalaignar’s house. The school is located in close proximity to Anna Salai, and therefore, a preferred choice of exam centre for many parents. 

NEET has been severely criticised for it being beyond the ken of rural students from non-English medium schools who had covered a state syllabus. Some parents granted that the paper could be tough and the questions incomprehensible, but most, hailing from a rural and semi-urban background, said that they had prepared their children for months, setting all their hopes on their gaining admission into medical college, a bright future, the chance for a better standing in life. 

They did not think going to a Tamil medium school would be a handicap for their children: many said their children had taken private tuition or gone to coaching classes and could answer the questions confidently. They thought they were second to none and could compete at any level. Pamphlets which were liberally distributed to them by a private medical college did not draw much attention because they thought lakhs of rupees required to educate their children was simply beyond their reach. They could afford to send their children only to government colleges where the tuition fee was affordable. 

And were they ready to leave their children, especially girls, in hostels in distant towns for a medical education? “Everyone should be prepared for it as higher education in India implies all that. You need to live away from your parents: that is what we are telling our kids,” came the reply.