By IT Correspondent
New Delhi, July 4:
In view of the COVID-19 pandemic, the examinations of JEE Main 2020, JEE Advanced and NEET 2020 will now be held in ensuing September, Union HRD minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank announced here on Friday.
The Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Main 2020 examination will be held from first September to 6 September, National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) 2020 examination will be held on 13 September and JEE Advanced exam will be held on 27 September 27.
The revision in JEE Main 2020, NEET 2020 exam dates is based on recommendations of the panel set up by Pokhriyal, to review the situation to conduct the examinations. Parents and students had begun rallying against the National Testing Agency (NTA) to clarify on NEET 2020 and JEE Main 2020 exam dates. Keeping in mind the safety of students and to ensure quality education we have decided to postpone JEE & NEET examinations, Pokhriyal stated.
JEE 2020 is the entrance examinations for admission into engineering institutes like Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and other technical institutes. These are the entrance examinations for admissions into the engineering and undergraduate medical courses.
NEET is an entrance examination in India for students who wish to study undergraduate medical courses (MBBS) and dental courses (BDS) in government or private medical colleges and dental colleges.
“As promised earlier, I have released the new dates. NTA has deferred the examination considering the coronavirus outbreak. I hope students will use this additional time to prepare for these examinations without any anxiety,” Pokhriyal added.
NEET and JEE examinations were originally scheduled to be held in May 2020. They were rescheduled in July 2020 after COVID-19 outbreak led to a nationwide lockdown.
Unlike the CBSE board examinations for Class X and XII which were cancelled to prevent infection spread due to the virus, cancellation of entrance examinations like JEE and NEET is not feasible. Close to one million students appear for JEE Main examinations every year and this year about 9,35,000 students have registered for JEE Main 2020. About 12,000 seats are available across IITs, every year.
When it comes to NEET, almost 1.5 million students register every year to seek admission into undergraduate courses at medical colleges. However only 50,000 odd seats are available.
It is anticipated that students who had planned to go abroad for higher education this year may also have applied for JEE Main examination, since popular study destinations like United States and United Kingdom have been badly affected by the Coronavirus pandemic. NTA which administers JEE, had, reopened the application process between 19 May and 24 May, 2020 to enable more students to apply.
Considering that these tests will now be held in September 2020, the final results are expected by October 2020 and the students may be able to join the engineering and medical institutes of their choice by November 2020. Now the academic calendar for medical and engineering courses for 2020 will have to be suitably amended due to the delay in these tests.
