From the ABVP issuing a statement to the NSUI protesting outside the Union Education Minister's residence to the AISA holding a demonstration at the gates of the ministry office - prominent student outfits, cutting across political affiliations, raised their voice against the National Testing Agency (NTA) and the Ministry of Education Thursday against the cancellation of the UGC-NET exam. While some demanded the Education Minister's resignation and the scrapping of NTA, the RSS-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) demanded a CBI probe into University Grants Commission-National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET). Around 40-50 students protesting outside the Ministry of Education (MoE) headquarters were briefly detained by the police. Announcing a country wide protest, student leaders of ABVP, in a statement on Thursday, said, “The problem of paper leaks has become very serious. ABVP demands CBI probe into NEET-UG exam. Copying mafias should not be spared, strict action should be taken against them.” Speaking to The Indian Express, Ashutosh Singh, the national media convenor of ABVP, said, “This is a massive failure on NTA’s part.For quite some time, we have been demanding that the UGC-NET be held in government colleges or schools, and government employees be deployed as invigilators so that there is a liability on them to ensure nothing goes wrong.” Meanwhile, several members of the All India Students Association (AISA), Students' Federation of India (SFI) and JNU Students' Union (JNUSU) held a demonstration at the Ministry of Education's office. “We will not take back our demands to scrap NTA and seek resignation of the Union Education Minister, Dharmendra Pradhan,” Said AISA's JNU unit president Ranvijay. AISA, in a statement, said, “We have seen massive discrepancies in the result of NEET-UG. NEET aspirants have been demanding a re-exam. However, the NTA and the MoE (Ministry of Education) responded to their demands with brutal detention and violence.” JNUSU President Dhananjay said, “Our protest today was to demand that the government holds the NTA accountable for the constant discrepancies that we have witnessed.When JNUSU, AISA and SFI members came down to protest here, the (security) forces in our country used violence to suppress the voices of their own students.” DCP, New Delhi, Devesh Mahla said about 40-50 people were detained from the protest at MoE. “Some were taken to Mandir Marg police station and others to Kanjhawala. The women were released around 5.30pm and the men were released at around 7 pm,” he added. The Congress’s student wing, National Students' Union of India (NSUI), protested at the gate of Pradhan’s residence Thursday morning. Varun Choudhary, NSUI National President, said, “The Education Minister must immediately ban the NTA and take decisive action against the officials involved.” In a statement, NSUI said, “Ban the NTA, and hold all parties responsible (for the fiasco) accountable to restore trust among students and the public.”
