Millions of students at risk: India’s elite exams hit by corruption ‘scam’
www.aljazeera.com
More than 3 million aspirants took India’s top tests for medical and research schools. Their future is now uncertain.

This shit is so crazy. A bit of an old news but I don’t know if people outside of India caught wind of this.

The National Testing Agency (NTA), an autonomous body under India’s Ministry of Education that is responsible for holding the nationwide examinations, is at the centre of these controversies over the integrity of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), a national exam for medical aspirants held last month.

There are two NEET exams, one for undergrad and one for postgrad. The former was held but the results have been scrapped. The latter has been postponed. The postponement was announced the night before the exam.

The scale of foul play is something that I have not been able to wrap my head around mostly because I have not read the news articles about this recently. There were reports of some participants getting marks that were mathematically impossible and shit like that.

“Autonomous bodies” have become an extension of the ruling party. For example, BJP uses the Election Commision to arrest opposition leaders and freeze the funds of opposition parties. I wouldn’t be surprised if the NTA was chock full of deadbeat BJP lackeys. Truly a terrible time to be an Indian right now.

  • darkernations@lemmygrad.ml
    0·
    5 months ago

    You are right in that I should clarify with regards to limited resources; I mean developed infrastructure (both “soft” and hard eg people and buildings) in the context of an underdeveloped country like India and the uneven development in wealthier capitalist countries taken as a whole.

    Furthermore we should also consider a privatised system can include “public” infrastructure systems in a capitalist country (there are myriad ways one could analyse this from the financialisation of tuition fees to the contracting out of education materials and infrastructure that is overwhelmingly dictated by the private sector).

    My argument is not really for or against entrance exams (this should be determined through peer reviewed research and may be discipline specific) but there are other loci of focus that are of greater importance to avoid higher education just reflecting wealth demographics and bourgoisie sensibilities including the artificial scarcity of higher paid labour.

    I also tend to lean towards Paolo Friere’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed on a more enlightened path for education.