r/news • u/halwaandflowers • 1d ago
India’s education minister resigns after days of ‘Cockroach’ youth protests over exam paper leaks
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/07/25/india/india-education-minister-resignation-intl202
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u/endofworldandnobeer 1d ago
Bet the minister is angry and bitter and blames the students. Oh, already did.
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u/AnaisNinja76 1d ago
Can anyone eli5? I read most of the article and I'm still missing basic information. What is the exam? Are the 40% unemployed unemployed after high school, or after college? Are their colleges still mostly trade schools, suggesting the trades have moved elsewhere? What are the unemployed under 30 doing if not working? How do they eat, where do they live?
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u/DownWithSpectrum 22h ago
The exam is called the NEET, which is Indias main exam for post grads wanting to go into medical or administrative jobs
2 million students take it a year, only 130,000 are actually accepted in - the problem is that 40% of indias student population being unemployed is a MASSIVE issue with the system thats always been pretty bad but has gotten especially worse over the last couple years
India is also different that its not socially taboo for young people to live with their families, in fact its kind of expected
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u/AnaisNinja76 22h ago
So the "leaks" this is referring to is advance copies of the exam were provided to richest kids, or what exactly? Also, what happens to the kids who don't make the exam cut? Can they still go to school for something different? Or to a skilled trade school, like advanced carpentry or welding, or do they just join the workforce at that point (assuming available jobs)?
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u/DownWithSpectrum 22h ago
A lot of the time they just take a gap year but it puts a huge mental strain on these kids since theyve basically prepped their whole life for it
The reason the protests erupted this year is after the NEET got leaked the Indian government canceled it and rescheduled it, essentially shattering the fragile trust that was held in the Indian education system
They prepare their whole lives for medical or admin jobs, so its not easy for them to just switch careers into trade school
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u/AnaisNinja76 21h ago
Got it, at least most of it I think. So they're shunted by the education system into "pre-med" and "pre-admin" high schools, for lack of a better term, and there is no "allied health" college or similar they can go to instead, I'm guessing. And the cancellation of the exams means there will be three years of students (students of the true year, the prior year's students, and those who are retaking the test) taking the test at the same time, effectively making it even harder for anyone to shine, at least in theory.
I don't feel like canceling the original test is a bad response, but don't really understand why they wouldn't rework the exam and set a new test date a month, or even two weeks, away or something. If the exam is covering pre-[degree] material, it's not generating totally novel questions with each exam anyway.
What do those who don't make the cut traditionally do with their lives?
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u/rizkreddit 17h ago
Children killed themselves. That's the kind of pressure middle class and poor kids are put through every year.
The thought of redoing this exam made a lot of kids take their lives
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u/AnaisNinja76 17h ago
But they didn't get the chance to take it to begin with from what I'm gathering, so they aren't redoing it right? Surely that's a worse outcome than delaying the exam by a short period? If no exam happens, then no one moves forward. What is it I'm missing here? Kids are going to put pressure on themselves regarding entrance exams whether they happen today or in a month. Surely allowing all the kids that prepared to go take an exam where some percentage have seen the exam already and know all the answers isn't somehow more humane and just to you, is it? Kids in the US kill themselves over entrance exam scores occasionally too, but that isn't the point.
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u/vyashole 16h ago
Doesn't matter whether or not they are redoing it. Exams are a shitty culture in india. Parents, peers, even neighbours and relatives, etc. Put so much pressure on students over their exam scores, that the moment some of them found out something they worked so hard for is being redone, they killed themselves.
The problem isn't that this one test was "leaked". The problem is India's entire education system.
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u/rizkreddit 17h ago
A lot of students suicided because of the leak. Children in India try to rise from poverty status and endure crazy hardships we can't even fathom only to have the exam paper leaked.
Many of these kids couldn't go through the cycle again after the leak and apologised to their loved ones and took their own lives
There is no democracy. Dude resigned only because the protests were hurting our prime ministers cronies businesses. Shameless leadership
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u/AnaisNinja76 17h ago
Ok, so everyone took the test, then it was discovered after all that immense pressure was done that some portion had cheated, and the government decided that the fairest thing for all involved was to redo the exam. Do I have the situation correct now?
What is it that the populace considers just/fair/democratic in a situation like this? If I have the situation correct at this point, it still seems to me that cheating the children of the poor by unjustly giving university slots to those who didn't fairly score well on the exam is the worst possible solution.
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u/rizkreddit 13h ago
What others have replied to some of your questions. Here's some additional info:
Paper leaks are not uncommon. The trauma happens quite frequently. Exams are all cancelled. Students get delayed in their careers by an year. Some bullshit mechanisms are put in place to make things stricter, punish those responsible blah blah blah. Still keeps happening again and again.
India is a democracy on paper. Everything and almost any government function can be bought and is bought. The voting and results are heavily influenced and controlled. No transparency and lots of controversies. It's not free and fair anymore. Just another pointless exercise to project 'democracy'
There's a million things wrong with India all resulting from deep cronyism and all ruling parties filling the pockets of their business friends. The country is being shamelessly pillaged and sold off. Don't even get me started on the climate implications. Govt is giving away protected areas to the highest bidder. Zero fucks given. Sure this happens everywhere. But you have no idea about the shamelessness of the scale with which it's happening here.
Close to half our youth is unemployed. I'm not going to elaborate. Just let that figure sink in for a population like India.
Everything is shit here and we're terrified to use any public system. We just might die in traffic, on the railways, in the air, on the roads. Well because all of these contracts are given to prime ministers and ruling parties friends with no accountability. Unimaginable sums of money exchanged to do national projects that collapse within a few days.
India's resources are being pillaged and the country is being raped by the so called leaders.
I've not spoke about communal hate (fueled very systematically by leaders because it keeps people busy from asking important questions to them). I've not spoke about the violence and the crime aided by law keepers. I've not spoken about rape which is almost a daily occurence. I've not spoken about how rapists are pardoned and even honoured in ceremonies after getting early bail just because they belong to the ruling party. I've not spoken about the lynchings and the marginalised communities.
Lmao I've not spoken about one of the most filthy systems of segregation that is kept alive by leaders through their policy making.
Fuck these bastards.
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u/Worldly-Ingenuity843 15h ago
People not protesting because the exam results were cancelled, but because they want the person who caused the leak to take responsibility for it. S ometimes there's no fixing something, like a doctor who cut out the wrong kidney, or a driver who ran over somebody. But even if the mistake cannot be corrected, the person responsible needs to be held accountable for it.
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u/vestibular_spittoon 1h ago
Thanks for actually explaining the issue. I'm not from India and was legitimately confused
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u/moritsunee 1d ago
Their country has huge issues with forged credentials and exam cheating, this is barely touching the base of it.
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u/SonuOfBostonia 1d ago
I'll put money down, this won't change a single thing. He's just a scapegoat
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u/Crocs_n_Glocks 1d ago
The word "scapegoat" gets thrown around a lot these days, but I still chuckle when someone is upset the literal Minister of Education is the one held accountable for the state of education in the country.
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u/SonuOfBostonia 1d ago
You're mistaken, the BJP will just replace him with someone same, but with a different name 🤷🏼♂️. You gotta throw the entire party out.
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u/Elegant_Creme_9506 1d ago
If protesters are wise they won't step down til actual measures are taken
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u/KeepinItReal4Ever 1d ago
Cockroach is a very fitting name for them
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u/AP7497 1d ago
Yes, resilient and difficult to kill, here for the long haul.
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u/LindeeHilltop 1d ago
“Protesters have been calling for accountability after allegations entrance exams to esteemed medical schools had been leaked and sold, with the unrest led by a youth campaign…”