The Supreme Court has directed the All India Institute of Medical Sciences to postpone the INI CET 2021 exam by at least one month. Till now, the exam was scheduled to be held on June 16, 2021. The court was hearing petitions filed by doctors and medical associations demanding the postponement of the examination since doctors on COVID-19 duty do not have adequate time to prepare.
Recently, the All Indian Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi announced that the INI CET 2021 exam for admission to PG Medical programs in some of the top medical colleges of India will be held on June 16, 2021. This led to immediate dissent among aspirants who were earlier promised that at least a month’s time will be given before the exam. However, the INICET exam date was announced only in the last week of May 2021.
As per latest reports, the division bench of Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice MR Shah has ruled that AIIMS’ decision to conduct the exam on June 16, 2021, is arbitrary leaving aspirants with no time for preparation. “Why not postpone the exam by a month”, the bench said.
The institute was initially reluctant to postpone the exam citing that it will lead to a scarcity of doctors. AIIMS suggested aspirants can appear in the next INICET 2021 exam reportedly scheduled to be held in November. However, once the top court ruled that legal orders will be passed if AIIMS did not voluntarily postpone the exam, the institute came to terms. As per reports, the AIIMS lawyer consulted with authorities and later agreed to honour the decision of the top court.
INICET 2021 is therefore scheduled to be deferred now, much to the relief of graduate doctors, who are already engaged in COVID duty. This is the main reason behind the protests on the micro-blogging site Twitter indicating that the decision is unfair. As per reports, earlier, the government had assured that at least a month’s time will be provided before conducting the exam. However, the exam date was announced recently with only about 2 weeks to go.
Based on media reports, the INICET 2021 exam is to be held to fill up 800 seats in PG medical degree courses such as MD, MS, M.Ch, DM etc. Approximately 80000 candidates are going to take the INICET 2021 exam as per the latest reports. While the medical entrance exam is taken by doctors having a graduate medical degree, such doctors are already engaged in COVID duty serving the healthcare sector from the frontline during the times of a global pandemic.
Evidently, if the exam was to be conducted on June 16 as announced earlier, doctors would not have enough time to prepare. Furthermore, it is also being said that it is impossible for doctors serving outside of their city to appear for INICET 2021 in a chosen centre amidst the pandemic when public transport is suspended.
