New Delhi, 15 June 2021 – With the addition of Punjabi and Malayalam, the national-level medical entrance exam NEET-UG 2021 will now be conducted in a total of 13 languages. The newly-appointed Union Education Minister, Dharmendra Pradhan, announced the same on Tuesday, while adding that “the languages now being offered (to NEET-UG aspirants) are Hindi, Punjabi, Assamese, Bengali, Odia, Gujarati, Marathi, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Tamil, Urdu, and English”.
Pradhan also added that this is an encouraging step, which falls directly in line with PM Narendra Modi’s vision of promoting regional languages under the New Education Policy 2020.
Furthermore, he also announced that a new exam center for the NEET-UG exam has been established in Kuwait to felicitate the Indian students living in the Middle East.
NEET UG 2021 – Exam in 13 Languages
With the announcement of holding the NEET-UG exam 2021 in several diverse languages through his official Twitter handle, the Education Minister has taken a welcoming step to ease and provide wider opportunities for each of the respective states. The 13 modes of languages for NEET 2021 include:
| English | ||
| Hindi | Odia | Malayalam |
| Punjabi | Gujarati | Kannada |
| Assamese | Marathi | Tamil |
| Bengali | Telugu | Urdu |
NEET UG 2021 – Exam Centre in Kuwait
Indian students, teachers, and parents living in the middle-east have greeted and welcomed the Indian Government’s decision to open the first-ever exam centre for NEET-UG aspirants in Kuwait. Numerous students have expressed their gratitude to Indian Ambassador Sibi George, who exerted considerable efforts to open a NEET exam center for Indian students in Kuwait.
On an interesting note, Kuwait is currently the only center for the NEET exam outside India.
NEET UG 2021 – Revised Exam Pattern
The National Testing Agency has introduced changes in the exam pattern of NEET-UG 2021. Earlier, the NEET exam pattern comprised 180 objective-type questions. Candidates were given 4 options out of which they had to choose a single correct answer. . The answers were required to be written and submitted on a specially designed machine-gradable sheet using a ballpoint pen.
Now, the revised exam pattern of NEET-UG exam 2021 will have:
- 2 sections (A and B) for each for all the 4 subjects (Physics, Chemistry, Biology (Botany and Zoology)
- Section A will consist of 35 questions and Section B will have 15 questions
- From Section B, candidates will be able to choose and attempt any 10 questions out of 15 questions
Note: This exam pattern is quite similar to the one followed for the JEE exam.
COVID-19 Protocols for NEET Exam 2021
On Monday, 12th July, Dharmendra Pradhan took to his Twitter handle to announce that the NEET-UG examination, which was earlier scheduled for 1st August, has been deferred to 13th September 2021. He also stressed on following precautions stringently for the COVID-19 pandemic. He mentioned that it would be obligatory to maintain physical distancing at centres and has, as a result, decided to ramp up the number of cities (with NEET centres) to 198 from the previous 155.
He further notified the below-mentioned protocols for NEET:
- Face mask to be provided to all candidates at the exam venue,
- Staggered time slots must be followed during students’ entry and exit,
- Contactless registration to be followed,
- Proper sanitization to be maintained,
- Seating to be done with social distancing, amongst many others precautions.
More on NEET-UG 2021
- There has been no change in the age limit for candidates to be eligible to apply for NEET.
- Candidates must complete 17 years of age at the time of admission.
- To appear for NEET-UG, the upper age limit is 25 years, as on the date of examination. Relaxation of 5 years has been given for the candidates belonging to the SC/ST/OBC-NCL category and PwD.
- The application process for NEET 2021 started on 13th July 2021 at 5 PM and will continue till 6th August 2021.
- As many as 13.66 lakh candidates had appeared for NEET 2020 of whom 7,71,500 qualified. This year, it is expected that the number of appearing candidates may cross the previous count.
For more information on the NEET-UG application process 2021 and its relevant details, CLICK HERE.
