Candidates, parents seek deferment of NEET examination in violence-hit Manipur
The HinduGUWAHATI Medical career aspirants and their parents in violence-hit Manipur have urged the National Testing Agency to defer the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test scheduled on May 7. More than 5,000 candidates – many of them from the hill districts cut off from the centrally located Imphal Valley – were to have sat for NEET, the only national-level medical entrance examination in India for admission to various undergraduate courses, across 10 centres in Imphal. But they are unable to reach these centres due to the volatile situation besides an indefinite curfew across the valley and some surrounding hill districts. Manipur plunged into violence, arson and vandalism following a ‘Tribal Solidarity March’ on May 3 to protest a move to grant Scheduled Tribe status to the dominant Meitei community concentrated in the Imphal Valley.