Madras High Court questions Tamil Nadu govt over panel to analyse NEET impact

Chennai (Tamil Nadu) [India], June 29 : The Madras High Court on Tuesday ordered the Tamil Nadu government to respond to a plea moved by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) against the 9-member committee formed by the state to study the impact of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) on students from socially backward classes.
The Bench, headed by High Court Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee, told the state government to reply within a week.
The writ petition was fled by Tamil Nadu BJP secretary K Nagarajan against the constitution of the committee headed by Justice AK Rajan to study the impact of the medical entrance examination.
The Chief Justice said that the constitution of the committee appeared to be an exercise in futility since the Supreme Court had made it clear that Tamil Nadu must fall in line and accept NEET.
The state government must obtain the leave of the Supreme Court before constituting the committee, the court added.
While speaking to ANI, Paul Kanagaraj, chief of the Tamil Nadu BJP Legal Wing, expressed hope that the court would rule in favour of the petitioners.
"The High Court questioned the Advocate General R Shunmugasundaram because NEET in Tamil Nadu was introduced after an order from the Supreme Court. The SC said that TN is not a separate country, it is a state in India. Without keeping that in mind, a committee has been formed for what purpose?" Kanagaraju said.
He added, "How can the committee analyse this after the SC's orders? We challenged many things in the writ petition - the constitutional validity, the state and Central government's power and who does education come under. We are very satisfied with the Chief Justice's move."
He further said that the ruling party DMK was trying to confuse students on the issue.