States to give affidavit on translated NEET papers: Javadekar

The Centre would be taking affidavits from state governments on accuracy of translated NEET question papers from the next year, HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar today said.

The National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) is conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education for admission to MBBS/BDS courses.

Javadekar was responding to an issue raised by AIADMK member Vijila Sathyananth regarding inaccurate translation of NEET questions in Tamil and the problems faced by students during Zero Hour in Rajya Sabha.

She said 49 questions in the paper translated in Tamil were vague due to problems in translation and students suffered.

A PIL was filed in this regard and the court awarded grace marks to affected students, she said.

Javadekar said as the matter was in court, he won't speak much on the issue.

He, however said the translators were provided by the Tamil Nadu government.

The Minister further said that from the next year, the Centre would be taking affidavit from state governments that the translation done by their language experts was correct.

The AIADMK member had also pointed out that students appearing for the NEET exam had to travel to distant places to write the paper.

To this, Javadekar said he has already ordered that from the next year there would be no displacement of students.

As another member wanted to speak on the issue, Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu said the minister has assured the House that students need not go to other states and will have facility to write exam in their respective places.

In his Zero Hour mention, nominated member K T S Tulsi raised the problems faced by Indians and Indian IT companies following changes in the US visa policy.

He said Indians are facing deportation and IT companies were facing difficulties in hiring Indian talent.

This, he said, is despite three meetings between the Indian Prime Minister and the US President.

"We do not know whether this critical issue was ever taken up and if it was taken up what was the result of the same," he said.

BJP member Rajeev Chandrasekhar, in his mention, said Bengaluru has become a hub of narcotics. He said it is about time something should be done to deal with the situation before things become irreversible.

Shwait Malik (BJP) tried to highlight the problem of drugs in Punjab. He said Punjab, which was known as the food basket, has now become the "drug basket" and sought intervention of the Central government to address the menace in the state.

BJD MP Prasanna Acharya raised the issue of suicide among soldiers.

Citing a report, he said 500 jawans committed suicide last year and the number is increasing.

He also noted there were reports of a jawan killing a fellow officer or another jawan.

"It is very alarming situation. Why this is happening," the MP said and wanted to know if the government has tried to find out the reasons behind the suicides.