JUINO D’SOUZA
No government can afford to be deaf, dumb, and blind to the demands of thou sands of students who gathered at Jantar Mantar demanding the resigna tion of Union Education Minister, Dharmendra Pradhan blaming his min istry for the NEET paper leak while slamming the education system for fail ing to protect students’ future. The protestors were peacefully marching to wards the Parliament when they were blocked with barricades, lathich arged, brutally beaten, and tear-gassed, causing people to run helter-skelt er, screaming, with sever al suffering injuries. The right to peaceful protest is a fundamental human and democratic right and therefore can not be permitted to get invaded by politics. It is guaranteed by the Consti tution under Article 19(1) (a), freedom of speech and expression and Arti cle 19(1)(b), freedom to assemble peaceably and without arms. However since this right is not ab solute and is subject to “reasonable restrictions,” police authorities usually enforce the requirement of prior police permission and clamp prohibitory orders like Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, former ly Section 144 of the CrPC to thwart such peaceful protest. The question is: Can we allow the police force to become aggressive and violent when people are peacefully protesting? Our tradition teaches us tolerance, our philosophy preaches tolerance and our Constitution practises tolerance, if so, why was the police so intolerant? Why did the police fail in their duty of practising tolerance and protecting civil liberties by relying on empathy rather than immediate retribution? Why was the earlier Del hi Police Commissioner abruptly transferred and replaced by another Po lice Commissioner who instead of applying the right correctives ordered a police crackdown per haps at the behest of the Union Home Minister thereby resulting in bru talities against the public, with opposition political parties condemning the police action as a murder of democracy? At the same time we have also witnessed how opposition political par ties were quick to draw political mileage out of the protest movement with the Congress party led by Rahul Gandhi marching to the Prime Minister’s residence and staging a high-profile political sit-in dharna that culminated in police detention and sub sequent release.
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Now why were these mainstream politicians and opposition party members largely absent in the initial stages of the demonstrations? It was only after the youth led uprising started gath ering momentum and began attracting media attention that almost all opposition political lead ers were seen flocking to the podium to deliver speeches. The larger question is: Who should be held ac countable for the more than 20 students who have lost their lives across the country due to the se vere mental toll of exam uncertainty, prolonged preparation fatigue and the immense pressure of reappearing for anoth er NEET exam mainly because of the incompe tence of the government? One recalls that in 2024 the NEET-UG exam was also leaked and although the Education Minister had denied the paper leak, a CBI probe later re vealed that the paper leak originated from a specific centre in Hazaribagh and Patna, here the Supreme Court had refused to can cel the exam stating that a re-test would have a severe cascading effect on over 2.3 million students.
It is a sad state of affairs that in these days due to criminalisation of politics, governance has become the sole proprietary of elected leaders who call the shots with brute ma jority by twisting, turning and interpreting laws to suit their convenience and satisfy their egos which have been destroyed due to lack of political will. Unless people recognise civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights and demand these rights, we will never have an eq uitable society. It is commendable that the recent youth led uprising and revolu tion is dismantling the entrenched systems by organising protests and keeping the authoritarian government in check and control. In this context the Bangladesh Revolution with persistent student protests over nepotistic job quotas escalated into a movement that success fully collapsed the au thoritarian government of Sheikh Hasina is there for all to see. Education is the major driving force of econom ic development and the focal point of learning in a society.
The future of our country lies in im proving our education system and there has to be an academic, political and administrative will to change by promoting transparency and protect ing the fundamental right to fair testing in competi tive examinations. Today the credibility of Nation al Testing Agency that conducts NEET exams is facing a severe trust defi cit due to paper leaks, ad ministrative glitches, and controversies surround ing testing agencies. Re curring scandals of paper –leak has put thousands of sincere, hardworking aspirants under severe psychological distress causing an ongoing edu cation crisis.
The nation will soon celebrate its 80th Inde pendence Day in 2026 marking 79 complete years of freedom and our Constitution gave us a Sovereign, Socialist and Secular Democratic Re public. The first words of the Preamble – “We, the people” – signify that pow er is vested in the hands of the people of India, but alas, it appears that India belongs to the numerous scoundrels who are ruin ing the country. There must be a change of mindset and it is there fore high time that Par liamentarians put their shoulders together with great seriousness and wage a purposeful war to fight this desperate disease of paper leaks and many other scams including the job for mon ey scams. The change is not going to be easy, because the corrupt and unscrupulous politicians will fight back to pre serve their citadels, but a start has to be made somewhere. (The writer is lawyer, political analyst and a former State Informa tion Commissioner.)
