Tamil Nadu Anti-NEET Campaign: Udhayanidhi Stalin Challenges AIADMK MLA to Join – News18

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) will be holding a National Entrance-cum-Eligibility Test (NEET) abolition campaign next week, which is contributing to the intensification of the anti-NEET movement in Tamil Nadu. In an effort to abolish the medical entrance examination, the DMK, the state’s ruling party, went on a hunger strike last month. The DMK opposes NEET, contending that it is anti-social justice while maintaining that it benefits urban students and those who have access to coaching institutes.

The DMK has now called on all sections to join the campaign against NEET. Former minister and AIADMK MLA RB Udhayakumar was urged to take part in the campaign by Minister for Youth Welfare and Sports Udhayanidhi Stalin. This sparked a political divide between both the DMK and AIADMK, and Udhayanidhi responded by bringing up the AIIMS project, which has been on hold since 2019.

The Tamil Nadu Anti-NEET bill was passed two times in the assembly however failed to gain additional approvals. According to Udhayanidhi Stalin, Tamil Nadu’s Minister for Youth Welfare and Sports, the DMK is staging a series of rallies to end NEET, which has claimed 21 lives in a span of seven years.

Udhaynidhi Stalin has also voiced opposition to the NEET PG 2023 amended cut-off when the Union Health Ministry lowered it to zero. He took to the microblogging site ‘X’, formerly known as Twitter and wrote, “The notification of @MoHFW_INDIA reducing the NEET PG qualifying percentile to zero shows the true ‘standard’ of the entrance test.”

The post continued, “This unjust and biased decision proves that NEET is not a test to identify talent as claimed by the union government, but a screening mechanism to filter out the poor and marginalised students. The fascists supporting NEET at the cost of the lives of our dear children are answerable to this injustice and bias.”