Come January and the union government is set to introduce a set of new set reforms targeted at conducting incident free entrance examinations countrywide.

In an announcement on Tuesday, union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that state governments have been directed to extend support and participate to ensure examinations are conducted hassle-free.

Former ISRO Chairman Dr S Radhakrishnan-led panel of experts submitted to the government a report enlisting reforms for the National Testing Agency (NTA) and the authorities. This comes in the wake of several allegations of malpractice and paper leaks in the previous academic year’s NEET and UGC exams among others. The panel was constituted to ensure transparent, smooth and fair conduct of examinations by the NTA.

The panel was asked to scrutinize the existing security protocols related to the setting of the papers, distribution and other processes for various exams. It proposed a gradual transition to online tests with digitally transmitted question papers.

NEET was under the scanner over several irregularities including alleged leaks. Whereas,  UGC-NET was cancelled after the ministry received inputs that the integrity of the exam had been compromised.  Following this CSIR-UGC NET and NEET PG – were cancelled just days before the exam.
 
“The Radhakrishnan committee has submitted its recommendations and to implement it, the states’ cooperation is essential. I have appealed to everyone on this matter, especially regarding entrance examinations. I have appealed to all state government education secretaries. A new entrance exam series for the upcoming year will begin in January. Based on last year’s experiences, the government has introduced numerous reforms,” Pradhan said.

Also read: Centre’s exam panel considers reducing outsourcing and expanding online exams