National Board of Examinations (NBE) has officially announced that NEET PG 2021 exam is being deferred. However the notice is quite open-ended as to whether this means that the exam date is being postponed or not.
Here is a quick analysis of the matter so far.
On September 16, 2020, NBE published a notice with the exam dates of NEET PG 2021, NEET MDS 2021, FMGE Dec 2020, and DNB PDCET 2021 admission. As per that notice, the NEET PG 2021 exam date was announced as January 10, 2021.
Then on October 31, 2020, NBE published a notice announcing the deferment of the exam. The exact words were: “1. National Medical Commission (NMC) vide its communication No. NMC/Secy/2020/01 dated 29.10.2020 has informed that the matter of conduct of NEET-PG 2021 is being considered by the UG & PG Boards of the Commission in consultation with the stakeholders. 2. In view of the aforementioned communication from NMC, the provisional schedule for conduct of NEET-PG 2021 as announced by NBE vide its notice dated 16th September 2020 stands deferred till further notice.”
Ever since the notice came out, candidates who are preparing for the upcoming NEET PG exam started asking exactly what this means. More so, the exact meaning of “defer” started being searched on google (rising trends pertaining to NEET PG shows so on google trends).
Purely speaking from a meaning point of view, defer simply means to leave something until a later date (as per Oxford).
So as of now the notice simply means that the schedule that was published in September is not valid now. A new schedule at a later date will be published.
But does this mean that NEET PG 2021 exam date is postponed?
There is no concrete answer to that question right now. The final decision is upon NBE and the stakeholders referred in the notice, who are deciding upon the matter of conduct of NEET PG exam.
Last year NBE had released the NEET PG application form on November 1. Last date to apply was November 21. And the exam was held on January 5.
It is still possible to hold NEET PG 2021 on the previously announced date (January 10, 2021) as the month of November has merely started. Even if the decision comes in a few days or weeks, the registrations can be pushed back a bit and exam can be done without delays.
For this reason medical pundits are urging NEET PG candidates to keep preparing for the exam assuming no delay in the exam. The final decision, whatever it may be, will be announced by NBE in due course of time.
