No T.N. candidate in top 20 NEET ranks

No T.N. candidate in top 20 NEET ranks

Six candidates score over 700 to take top slots in the State

03/11/2021

Special Correspondent CHENNAI

This year, no candidate from the State was placed in the top 20 ranks in the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test’s (NEET) merit list. The first candidate from Tamil Nadu is ranked 23 in the country.

S.A. Geethanjali, who scored 710 marks, shares the spot with M. Pravin, S.K. Prasenjithan and R. Arvind, all of whom have scored the same marks, but have been ranked further down.

T. Archithaa and M.B. Hayagrivas, both with a score of 705, will probably qualify for the second rank in the State merit list.

Medical education officials said they would wait for clarification from the State government on the reservation policy, before issuing a notification regarding admissions.

The minimum qualifying mark to be eligible for admission this year for the unreserved (general category) is 138, as against 147 the last year. For other communities, it is 108. Last year, it was 113. In 2020, the qualifying marks for the category was reduced to 134, during the mop-up round counselling for deemed universities, by the Director General of Health Services. It is possible that a similar scenario will pan out this year as well. This means that qualifying marks could drop by a few points.

With a total of 9,100 seats, including 1,560 in deemed universities, the State is comfortably poised to accommodate more students.

This could, to some extent, also reduce cut-off marks for candidates aspiring for medical admissions.

“Since we have 11 new colleges and students from other parts of the country will not opt for them, it is safe to assume that our students will take all 1,450 seats in the new colleges,” said R. Prasad Manne, who has been coaching students from under-privileged backgrounds.

Only when the Education Department releases the details of students who have qualified from government schools, will a clearer picture of their performance and eligibility emerge.

Wishes a happy Deepavali 2021 to all my Readers

 

100% NEET score for Panvel girl as she turns eighteen

100% NEET score for Panvel girl as she turns eighteen

Yogita Rao & Ardhra Nair TNN

Mumbai/Pune: 02.11.2021

This was possibly the best ever birthday gift that Karthika Nair would have imagined. Nair, a Panvel resident, who scored 720/720 in NEET-UG and shared the top position in the country, turned 18 on Sunday. Though she was targetting the perfect score, she was not expecting to actually get it. A student of DAV Public School in Panvel, Nair will be considered as the third-ranker for the counselling round. Including the national topper, Maharashtra has two rankers — Hriday Mohite and Vaishnavi Sarda — in the top 20. NEET-UG results were announced on Monday. On Thursday, the Supreme Court gave a goahead to the National Testing Agency to release the results. Of 15.4 lakh students who appeared for the test, 8.7 lakh qualified nationally.

Speaking to TOI, Nair said that she would want to join AIIMS, Delhi, which is the best in the country. “I have always found physics very tough and had to put in extra efforts. I relied entirely on NCERT books for my preparation,” said Nair, whose father works for a private logistics firm and mother is a computer science lecturer at a Navi Mumbai college. While her interest lies in oncology, she would explore other fields too, she said.

She found this year’s NEET paper tougher than the previous years, but managed to crack it well. Previous years’ question papers and mock tests helped her in practising for the exam.

“Studying online in the pandemic was no tough task. There are students who may find it difficult to understand lectures online, but the teachers were helpful and we were saving time in commuting to school and coaching class,” said Nair.

Hriday Mohite, from Pune’s DAV Public School, ranked fifth with a few others but in counselling ranks 14th in the country and second in the state.

The football enthusiast is the son of anaesthesiologist Dr Vishal Mohite and IT professional Trupti Mohite. “When the answer key was released, we had a feeling that he would get top marks. He has always been good at studies and has worked hard for this,” said Dr Mohite. Hriday wanted to become a doctor since his school days.

Aus among 16 countries to OK Covaxin for entry

Aus among 16 countries to OK Covaxin for entry

02.11.2021

Australia will recognise Covaxin, apart from Covishield, allowing those fully jabbed entry into the country, reports Saurabh Sinha. While WHO’s emergency use listing is awaited, some of the 16 countries that have recognised Covaxin include Estonia, Greece, Iran, Mauritius, Mexico, Nepal, Oman, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe

13.7L files cleared out, 8L sq ft space freed

GOVT OFFICES

13.7L files cleared out, 8L sq ft space freed

New Delhi:  02.11.2021

In a massive weeding exercise, over 13.73 lakh files were cleared out and almost 8 lakh square feet of space freed in central government offices over the past month, as part of a special campaign for disposal of pendency from the government of India.

Minister of state for personnel Jitendra Singh, who on Monday reviewed the outcome of the special campaign launched on October 2, said that the government earned Rs 40 crore through disposal of scrap during this period. At the review meeting with top officials of department of administrative reforms and public grievances (DARPG) on outcome of the campaign here on Monday, Singh noted with satisfaction that more than 13.73 lakh files were weeded out of 15.23 lakh files identified for the purpose. Similarly, against the target of 3.28 lakh public grievances, 2.91 lakh were redressed within 30 days.

Out of 11,057 references from MPs, 8,282 were resolved. Moreover, 685 out of 834 identified rules and processes were simplified during the said period. Singh said the special campaign on disposal of pendency in government was conducted on the directions of the PM and the progress will be presented to him this week. He informed that during this campaign, files of temporary nature were identified and weeded out.

Bankers question arrest of ex-SBI chairman Chaudhuri

Bankers question arrest of ex-SBI chairman Chaudhuri

Feel It’ll Raise Fears Of Sanctioning Loans, Initiating Recovery

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Mumbai/New Delhi:  02.11.2021

Bankers have come out in support of Pratip C Chaudhuri, the former SBI chairman, and have questioned the way he was arrested in a case involving Alchemist Asset Reconstruction Company and an aggrieved borrower.

“Prima facie, it appears that the norms have been ignored. This is not the way it is done, without giving an opportunity to a person to be heard... It does not appear to be a case of corruption,” former SBI chairman Rajnish Kumar told TOI. He said that the case involved a dispute between an ARC and the property owner and one person seems to have been singled out. “It is not about an individual. Today it is him, tomorrow it may be someone else,” Kumar added.

Arundhati Bhattacharya, who succeeded Chaudhuri and was the first woman to head the country’s largest bank, too backed her former boss.

Ironically, the arrest came a day after the finance ministry’s norms on uniform staff accountability framework for non-performing assets (NPA) accounts of over Rs 50 crore, meant to protect bankers from bona fide business decisions that prove wrong later. Bankers have been wary of action by law enforcement agencies, prompting several of them to go slow in sanctioning loans, a concern that had prompted even PM Narendra Modi to step in and comfort them.

“Absolutely pathetic, is the system being gamed again by defaulters despite all efforts by Modi govt, time for overhaul of judicial processes to improve transparency and introduce accountability,” tweeted former SBI deputy MD Sunil Srivastava. Reacting to Kumar’s comments to a news platform, Mohandas Pai took to social media to seek government intervention.

Several bank executives said that Chaudhuri’s arrest will once again raise fears, not just in sanctioning loans but even in the recovery process, where lenders and borrowers often opt for settling the dues and waive the penal interest. SBI sources alleged that the borrower has sought to frustrate the bank’s attempts to recover the dues for a long time. Executives also pointed out that given the size of the transaction, it is unlikely that it would have been Chaudhuri’s decision. “Also, even in smaller loans, it is never one person who decides on the recovery action” an SBI executive said.

“If a defaulter can send a former bank chairman to jail on an allegation, how can bankers be expected to do this? The government has repeatedly assured us that authorities cannot pick up a banker without reason. The case has been filed just before the courts are closed for Diwali — this appears to be premeditated,” said a senior banker.

Biometric entry for central staff to resume from November 8

Biometric entry for central staff to resume from November 8

New Delhi:02.11.2021

With Covid cases on the decline, the Union government on Monday ordered resumption of biometric attendance for all its employees from November 8.

Biometric attendance, which involves pressing one’s fingers on a scanner, was discontinued across central government offices since last year, as a precautionary measure against Covid. Attendance was instead being maintained through physical registers.

An order issued by the department of personnel and training said the matter had been reviewed and “it has been decided to resume biometric attendance for all levels of employees”, with effect from next Monday. It added that the heads of departments would be responsible for ensuring sanitisers next to biometric machines. Also, physical distance of six feet must be maintained by all employees while marking attendance and if need be, additional biometric attendance machines may be installed to avoid overcrowding.

Asking all employees to wear masks at all times, including while waiting to mark their attendance, DoPT said designated personnel should be deployed near biometric stations to clean/wipe the touchpad/ scanner areas of biometric scanners frequently. TNN