After Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan announced the dates for NEET 2021, there was a huge sigh of relief from students across the country who were uncertain how their further education would pan out. With the announcement of the dates, format and the assurance that the number of centres would be increased to ensure the following of social distancing, both parents and students have got back to their preparations.
This announcement however came as a shock to the students from Bihar who were quite perturbed by the government’s insistence that social distancing would be strictly followed.  They believe that it is unfair and would lead to the decimation of Bihar’s most profitable industry.
A student from Patna said, “This is against our cultural norms and traditions. Social distancing would mean that it would be impossible to copy during the exam. How can our Chief Minister Nitish Kumar allow this to happen? He should threaten to pull out of the NDA.”
The exam copying industry is rampant in the state of Bihar and is known to go to great lengths to ensure that its customers are satisfied. However, this year they are not too certain. One of the key lynchpins of the so-called “exam mafia” spoke to us on the promise of anonymity.
“We will need to recruit more manpower which would mean lower profits. We are still not sure what the government meant by social distancing. The increase in the number of centres would mean that we will have to spread our resources quite thin. This may result in us not delivering on our promises and parents refusing to pay us. In a year, the whole industry would collapse.”
Parents we spoke to also echoed the same opinion that the copying experts need to figure out how they will tackle this situation.
This episode is also available as a blog post: http://thedailyvanilla.com/2021/07/13/bihar-neet-2021-aspirants-claim-social-distancing-will-destroy-its-most-profitable-industry/