TN to abolish CET for professional courses

CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu government announced on Monday it has proposed to do away with the common entrance examination (CET) for admission into professional courses in colleges. It has proposed introduce a bill during the assembly session staring on December 4 for abolishing the system.

The government’s stand is based on the recommendations of the expert committee headed by Dr M Ananthakrishnan, former vice-chancellor, Anna University. Every year, lakhs of class twelve students write CET for admission into professional colleges.

Accordingly, the Cabinet will examine the ways for doing away with the system and introducing and adopting a bill in the coming session, an official release said. It said the government is of the view rural people and poor were deprived of equal opportunities during entrance examinations.

It recalled, in his address to the Assembly in May this year, the governor said the CET has become highly expensive and a source of unnecessary hardship for the students.With a view to ensuring a level playing field to students from rural areas and poor families and those from urban areas, the governor said the government will constitute a committee of educational experts to recommend suitable measures for abolition of CET from the academic year ’07-08. Following this, an experts committee was formed on july 7 under the head of Dr Ananthakrishnan.