The National Testing Agency (NTA) is conducting the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) beginning Tuesday with slots scheduled till Sunday. Despite protests to postpone the examination, as many as 858,000 candidates were expected to take the test across 660 centres in the country.
Candidates have been protesting on social media against the holding of the scheduled JEE (Main) and NEET exams in September. Their call was also backed by several opposition parties. However, the Centre decided against it so that “a crucial year of the students is not wasted.”
While the NEET exam is set to be conducted on September 13, JEE (Main) started today. Here’s everything you need to know:
*The JEE (Main), being held between September 1 and 6, is for admission to engineering colleges such as IITs, NITs, IIITs and other centrally funded technical institutes.
*This is the first major nationwide entrance test being held since the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) started spreading wider in early March. As many students reached the exam centres, they were seen sanitising their hands. They also underwent thermal tests before entering the exam hall.
*States such as Madhya Pradesh, Telangana and Rajasthan have offered free travel to students appearing in the Joint Entrance Examination (Main), or JEE (Main), this week. Others such as Bihar and Odisha said they would deploy additional security forces outside examination centres to enforce social distancing norms.
*Despite their reservations against conducting the exam, opposition-ruled states have made elaborate arrangements for the test.
*The governments of West Bengal, Kerala and Punjab, which had opposed holding the JEE and other central entrance examinations, have also directed their transport departments to arrange buses for students to reach examination centres.
*The NTA has issued detailed guidelines for conducting the exam that include sanitization of examination rooms, maintaining a minimum distance of two metres between two tables and mandatory temperature checks on each candidate.
*Students are for the first time appearing for the examination with gloves on. Ashish Arora, head of academics at Jaipur-based Allen Career Institute says, they shouldn’t panic, must go through the guidelines in detail and remain careful.
*“Traffic police personnel would be posted at crucial places for smooth flow of traffic so that students reach on time,” said Bhubaneswar municipal commissioner PC Chaudhry, adding that there would be no restrictions on inter-state traffic to help students reach their examination centres.
