Hyderabad, May 12 (IANS) Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) working president K. T. Rama Rao slammed the Central government over cancelling the NEET undergraduate exam over question paper leaks.

He said the Central government should be ashamed that the situation has deteriorated to the point where the entire exam had to be cancelled due to the NEET question paper leak.

The former minister accused the Central government of playing with the lives of countless students who studied tirelessly day and night. This is yet another paper leak due to the NDA government’s failure to conduct exams efficiently. The incident repeated because no lessons were learned from the 2024 NEET question paper leak. This successive incompetence in conducting national eligibility exams has become a curse for students,” he said in a statement.

The BRS leader stated that over a hundred questions leaking the day before the exam has exposed the horrific flaws in the system. The Central Government has plunged nearly 23 lakh students who took the NEET exam this year across the country, along with their parents, into severe mental distress, he said.

KTR said the Central government must treat the question paper leakage issue with utmost seriousness and immediately order a high-level inquiry. “No matter how big the hands behind this are, all of them must be caught and severely punished, and the facts must be placed before the public.”

KTR demanded that the NEET exam be reconducted as soon as possible with utmost security to safeguard students’ futures. The Central government must take full responsibility for the NEET paper leakage and apologise to the students and their parents, he said.

Another BRS leader, R. S. Praveen Kumar, has termed as unfortunate the decision of the National Testing Agency (NTA) to cancel the NEET examination due to question paper leaks in Rajasthan.

The former IPS officer posted on X that it was truly distressing that this grim news regarding NEET has emerged even before the public could recover from the reports of atrocities committed against minor girls in Telangana, allegedly by the son of a BJP MP and Union Minister of State for Home.

“This is not the first time such an incident has occurred under BJP rule; similar leaks have taken place in the past as well. Yet, the attitude of the BJP leadership remains unchanged. One is left to wonder whether they possess the same level of concern for education as they do for business, elections, and communal strife,” said Praveen Kumar.

“Today, the future of hundreds of thousands of students across the country hangs in the balance. This is a dark day for the student community.”

“Prime Minister Modi, who will take responsibility for this? Where is our country headed?” he asked.

–IANS

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