Students and aspiring college teachers from across different universities staged a protest outside the University Grants Commission (UGC) office on June 16, 2017. The protest demonstration was against the scrapping of the National Eligibility Test (NET) in July.
Earlier in January, the University Grants Commission (UGC) decided to scrap the National Eligibility Test (NET) exam scheduled for July 2017 and shifted it to November 19. This meant that the NET exam in December won’t take place this year. The exam that was held twice a year and conducted for 83 subjects at multiple locations across the country, will now onwards only be held once a year.
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), which has been holding the test since 2014, had last week notified that the NET would be held in November. Rajesh Kumar Chaturvedi, chairman of CBSE, wrote to the HRD ministry resonating that due of heavy workload the JRF exam should be held just once a year. The exam in which over 5 lakh candidates take the exam every year, has been held twice a year since it was started in 1984.
The protesting students also raised concerns over the reduction of the cap to qualify for NET at 6 per cent from the 15 per cent earlier. They have also started a “Save NET exam” online petition, which will be submitted to the UGC. The petition can be found here.
Demonstrators said that holding it once a year will increase pressure on students. They attributed the reduction in qualifying percentage is part of a bigger plan where the government is enervating public funded education, by scuttling funds and seat cuts.
Feature Image credits: DU Fights back fb page
Niharika Dabral