#nonextfor2019batch: Protest Against National Exit Test Escalates
New Delhi:The protest against the upcoming National Exit Test (NExT) is escalating further with the announcement of Twitter storms, All India Protest Week, and the submission of signature petitions.
Opposing the exam, already All India Democratic Students' Organisation (AIDSO) has given a call to observe protest week from July 1 to July 7, 2023, in this regard. The association has also announced its decision to hold protest demonstrations throughout the country including the State capitals.
The association has demanded to "repeal the decision of imposing NEXT 1 on final year MBBS students in mid-session." Further, another demand of the association is to "resist introduction of NEXT- the blueprint to handover medical education to private coaching centers."
Referring to the NExT Exam and NMC Webinar in this regard, in a recent press release, the Vice-President of AIDSO All India Committee, Dr. Mridul Sarkar mentioned, "We vehemently protest this anti-student attitude of NMC and demand immediate withdrawal of the decision to start the NExT Step 1 exam during the session. We call upon the students of the country to build up mighty students' movement against this undemocratic decision."
AIDSO has also called for an online signature petition against NExT across the country. Addressing the NMC Chairman, the association expressed its shock regarding the sudden implementation of NExT and mentioned in the petition, "NMC has announced for NExT hastily without giving any time for preparation. It was said that the webinar would be held to reduce the anxiety of the students. But ,in fact, after announcement of NExT from the 2019 batch, it has created undue pressure and anxiety particularly on the final year batch students and on the students of different batches as a whole. In our running curriculum, we had to appear final MBBS exam with four subjects, but in NExT, curriculum of which is completely unknown to us, we will have to study 19 subjects. Is it humanly possible for us to go through all these subjects? We expected that before introducing this, NMC would take opinions of medical students, teachers and educationists of the country which is a democratic process to replace a time tested long term exam system. On the contrary NMC has declared its decision unilaterally and during the midway of the session."
The association has also criticised Rs 2,000 fees for the mock test, the pattern of MCQ type questions for the examination etc. "...it is claimed that the purpose of NExT is to standardise MBBS graduate uniformly across the country. How is it possible so long the infrastructural standard remains poor in most of the medical colleges, both private and government? Uniform standard can be achieved only by improving and making uniform standard of infrastructure," the association mentioned.
"...in the new system, two exams are required to get licence to practice in our country, one is NExT 1 which is a national level competitive exam and another is NExT 2 which is University exam after completion of internship. In this new system we are being victimized and are suffering from tremendous stress and anxiety," it further added.
As a part of the protest against NExT, a Twitter Storm has been announced on July 5, 2023. The Twitter storm will commence at 4PM and continue till 6PM.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that the NMC NExT Regulations, 2023, were published in the official Gazette on June 28, 2023. "These Regulations shall come into force at once from the date of their publication in the official Gazette," mentioned the apex medical commission.
This comes after recently NMC organised an webinar to address the concerns and doubts of medical students regarding the National Exit Test. Meanwhile, NMC has also released the Information Brochure for the exam, announcing that All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi will be in charge of conducting the examination.
These newly notified NMC, National Exit Test Regulations, 2023 include different topics including the purpose of NExT, who can appear in the examination, etc. Apart from these, NMC in these Regulations have discussed about broad outline and general features of the NExT, details about NExT Step 1, NExT Step 2, and different factors regarding NExT score such as the nature of Scoring, Minimum Scores to pass, Calculation of NExT step 1 scores, Utility of NExT scores etc.
Further, these Regulations include Information regarding NExT Step 1 including its objective, distribution of items and knowledge level of questions, papers and distribution of subjects etc. These Regulations also specified about proposed time scheduled of papers, Information regarding NExT Step 2 such as its objectives, evaluation methods, distribution of subjects etc. They also include the time schedule of NExT exam and associated events.
However, doctors have opposed the decision of conducting the NExT exam for the 2019 MBBS batch. They have termed it to be a violation of NMC Act, 2019. Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that opposing the exam, the doctors and medical students had expressed their opinions in this regard on social media platforms.
The protest against the upcoming NExT examination is gradually escalating further. Protesting against the NExT Examination, students of Dr Radhakrishnan Government Medical College in Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh staged a protest on Saturday.
Students of Prasad Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow are also protesting against the upcoming examination. Meanwhile, students of SMMH Medical College, Saharanpur have submitted a petition to the principal saying that NExT should be implemented from the new MBBS batches and not the existing ones. Students of PRM MCH Odisha are also opposing the exam. Demonstration in this regard was also shown by the students of IMS and SUM hospital.
Protesting against the exam, medical students held demonstrations on Doctors' Day at Rajshree Medical Research Institute, Bareilly, Rampurhat govt medical College, West Bengal, Saraswathi Institute of Medical Sciences College in Uttar Pradesh, AGMC, Tripura, CNMC, West Bengal, MKCGMCH, Odisha. Further, Demonstrations were also held in Rajasthan, North Bengal Medical College, West Bengal as well. Photos and videos of these protests are circulating on the social media platforms.
Final year MBBS Students of PGIMS Rohtak are planning to submit the concerns of students regarding NExT examination to the National Medical Commission through the University authorities. They have asked the students to send the concerns regarding NExT in writing so the same can be forwarded to the authorities.
In this regard, a final year MBBS student at the institute, Pankaj Bitthu mentioned in a recent Tweet, "We shall be submitting the concerns of students regarding NExT examination though our University authorites at PGIMS, Rohtak as they have assured us to discuss the same and forward it to @NMC_IND officials. #NONEXTFOR2019BATCH."
Meanwhile, in a recent Tweet, the National President of All India Medical Students' Association (AIMSA), Dr. Jitendra Singh informed that the office bearers of AIMSA will meet the Union Health Minister and NMC Secretary on Wednesday regarding NExT exam.
Also Read: Should 2019 MBBS batch give NExT exam? Doctors point out violations of NMC Act
