"Give Us a Fair Chance": Doctors protest at Jantar Mantar demanding NEET PG 2022 postponement to July

New Delhi: Around 50 doctors under the umbrella of FAIMA doctors association gathered at Jantar Mantar yesterday and demanded justice for the NEET-PG 2022 aspirants who are about to appear in the centralized common post-graduate medical entrance examination on May 21 when the admission process for NEET-PG 2021 is not over yet.

Participating in a peaceful protest, the doctors were seen holding placards that read "Justice Delayed is Justice Denied", "We Gave Our Time but You Didn't Give Yours", "Save the COVID warriors", and "We Demand a Fair Chance" among others.

Representatives from Delhi Medical Association, and Indian Medical Association also joined the protest, informed Dr. Rohan Krishnan, the President of Federation of All India Medical Association (FAIMA).

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that doctors have been protesting against the insufficient time gap between NEET PG 2022 date and the counselling schedule of NEET PG 2021. Referring to the fact that the exam date is almost clashing with the counselling schedule the demand of the doctors is to defer the exam from May to July.

While the aspirants have been vocal about the issue on social media and demanding to postpone the exam in their Twitter post, several Associations have come in support of these doctors. Already FAIMA has written to the Union Health Ministry highlighting the issue and All India Medical Students' Association (AIMSA) has taken the matter to the Supreme Court.

Also Read: PostponeNEETPG_Modiji: Doctors launch Twitter Storm

Recently, the doctors launched a Twitter storm using the hashtag #POSTPONENEETPG_MODIJI and urged the Prime Minister to intervene. Even though the demands for deferring the exam is escalating day by day, the authorities, on the other hand, have not responded to it yet. In fact, Health Ministry officials have reportedly confirmed that the exam schedule would not change.

In such a context, in order to escalate the matter further, the doctors under the umbrella of FAIMA gave a call for a peaceful protest at Jantar Mantar on May 8 i.e. Sunday and around 50 doctors gathered at the venue demanding for deferment of the examination to July.

Speaking to Medical Dialogues the president of FAIMA doctors association, Dr. Rohan Krishnan said, "The issue of NEET-PG examination has been going on for quite long now and the students are in a lot of distress and they are getting mentally traumatized and harassed which needs to be addressed at the earliest. One should also think of a permanent solution to this issue. There should be NEET examination twice a year just like AIIMS and DNB examination. Then why not NEET PG? One of the major problems that the doctors face is that they have to wait for one year after writing the exam once. So, in the long run, the Government must consider a solution like this so that the aspirants can appear in the exam again within six months. 

"Right now the situation is quite serious as it would be really difficult for these candidates to appear in the exam in May. The candidates are now suffering from the phobia of whether they will secure a seat in the NEET PG 2021 counselling. When the admission process of 2021 is still not over then how the government can expect that the students will write the exam within 10 days. Previously, there used to be a gap of around 6 months between the admission process of the previous year and the entrance examination of the next year. So, it is only justified that there is a gap of a minimum of 2-3 months in the present scenario," he added.

Also Read: Doctors to hold Protest at Jantar Mantar demanding Postponement of NEET PG 2022