NEWS TODAY 15 - 17 .10.2023

 

Prayagraj: Doctor father appears in NEET with daughter, excels

Prayagraj: Doctor father appears in NEET with daughter, excels

By  K Sandeep Kumar, Prayagraj

Oct 17, 2023 04:30 PM IST

Sangam city neurosurgeon Dr Prakash Khaitan preprepared and appeared in the all-India entrance exam along with his daughter despite his heavy load of patients and surgeries and qualified the exam along with her this year.

Parents often resort to scolding, close-monitoring and even nagging their children during exam times, especially in the run up to professional entrance exams to ensure success of their wards.

Sangam city neurosurgeon Dr Prakash Khaitan (HT)

But a noted Sangam city neurosurgeon Dr Prakash Khaitan, 49, took a unique path to motivate his 18-year-old daughter Mitali to clear her medical entrance examination.

He preprepared and appeared in the all-India entrance exam along with his daughter despite his heavy load of patients and surgeries and qualified the exam along with her this year.

His ploy worked too and his daughter bagged admission in a top medical college of the country based on her NEET (UG) score.

“My daughter was struggling to retain her interest in studies post Covid-19. I got her admitted to a coaching institute in Kota, Rajasthan, but she was not comfortable with the environment there and returned home. With tough competition for bagging a MBBS seat in India, I decided to motivate my daughter by studying along with her and appearing in the NEET (UG)-2023 exam with her,” said Dr Khaitan, who is a Guinness World Records holder for performing an eight-hour surgery on an eight-year-old girl and removing 296 cysts from her brain, on April 13, 2011.

So, Dr Khaitan started studying for the NEET exam stealing time out of his busy schedule and heavy load of patients owing to his being just a handfulof neurosurgeons in Prayagraj.

“It was a after a gap of 30-odd years that I prepared for the medical entrance exam, something which I had done as a student while appearing for CPMT in 1992. I guided Mitali and constantly tried to motivate her to put in the hard work that the entrance exam needs to clear it,” Dr Khaitan said.

Clearing CMPT in 1992, Dr Khaitan had bagged admission in MLN Medical College, Prayagraj (then Allahabad) and after completing his MBBS went on to complete his MS (surgery) in 1999 and then M.Ch (neurosurgery) in 2003 from King George Medical College, Lucknow.

For NEET (UG)-2023 exam, the father and daughter got different centres on May 7.

Dr Khaitan appeared at a centre in Shivkuti while Mitali did so at Jhunsi. When the results came out in June, Mitali pipped her dad bagging over 90 percentile while Dr Khaitan secured 89 percentile.

Though the NEET (UG)-2023 mop up round of counselling continued till September third week, Mitali bagged MBBS admission in Kasturba Medical College, Manipal of Karnataka in July itself.

“I believe the message that I wanted to give to my daughter, and everyone is that there is no age to study. Commitment and hard work can help you succeed no matter how much things change or seem uphill, he added with a smile.