This shit is so crazy. A bit of an old news but I don't know if people outside of India caught wind of this.
The National Testing Agency (NTA), an autonomous body under India’s Ministry of Education that is responsible for holding the nationwide examinations, is at the centre of these controversies over the integrity of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), a national exam for medical aspirants held last month.
There are two NEET exams, one for undergrad and one for postgrad. The former was held but the results have been scrapped. The latter has been postponed. The postponement was announced the night before the exam.
The scale of foul play is something that I have not been able to wrap my head around mostly because I have not read the news articles about this recently. There were reports of some participants getting marks that were mathematically impossible and shit like that.
"Autonomous bodies" have become an extension of the ruling party. For example, BJP uses the Election Commision to arrest opposition leaders and freeze the funds of opposition parties. I wouldn't be surprised if the NTA was chock full of deadbeat BJP lackeys. Truly a terrible time to be an Indian right now.
I agree with you in essence but there are a lot of differences between USA and India in this context. Prep and tuition fees are inhibiting for most of the potential aspirants but they are much lower than in the US. The result is that way way more people are able to prepare for and take these entrance exams. In the US on the other hand, you first need an ultra expensive undergrad degree, then medical school applications and interviews and so forth. In India, massive tutoring companies are the beneficiaries. Allen Career Institute for example posted a total revenue of about INR 20,000,000,000 last year and there are four or five other companies like this along with the god knows many small businesses and individuals in this sector. All this for preparing high school students for entrance exams. There is a city called Kota in Rajasthan where:
(Hostels in Kota are outfitted with special ceiling fans designed to prevent suicide by hanging.)
Those who are very wealthy and want to skip this process do one of two things. They either study abroad. Or study in private colleges where admissions can be bought but they are usually not considered prestigious, not that it matters to those already with a lot of wealth. There is little advantage that an extremely wealthy aspirant has in these exams compared to someone who is moderately wealthy or even just upper middle class.
These exams are rather meant as a bottleneck between an extremely large number of aspirants and an extremely low number of vacancies in higher education. The exams are very difficult to present an illusion of meritocracy but the "competitiveness" is a foil for a weak and wanting education system.