The National Testing Agency (NTA) will conduct Joint Entrance Examination (JEE), Main in more regional languages for admission to the National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and other engineering colleges, Union education minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank said on Thursday. The NTA conducted the entrance test in three languages this year — English, Hindi and Gujarati.
“In line with the vision of NEP 2020, the Joint Admission Board of the JEE (Main) has decided to conduct the JEE (Main) examination in more regional languages of India,” the minister tweeted.
The examination will be conducted in the regional languages where entry to the state engineering colleges is decided based on an examination conducted in language of the region, he said.
“State language of the States who admit students based on the JEE (Main) will also be included under this. The decision of JAB will help students comprehend questions better & score higher,” he added.
The minister did not share any further detail on the regional languages in which JEE-Main will be conducted. He also did not give any timeline for implementation of the decision.
Official sources in the ministry said that the NTA will prepare a list of the regional languages for conduct of the JEE-Main based on consultation with the states.
The NTA conducts the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) in 11 languages, and the examination data released by the testing agency this year indicate a slight increase in the candidates registering for the entrance test in Hindi, Bengali, Assamese and Tamil.
Nearly 16 lakh students registered for NEET this year. Of them, 79.08 per cent had registered for the test in English, 12.80 per cent in Hindi, 3.70 per cent in Gujarati, 2.29 per cent in Bengali, 1.07 per cent in Tamil, 0.39 per cent in Marathi, 0.33 per cent in Assamese, 0.12 per cent in Urdu, 0.10 per cent in Telugu and 0.06 per cent in Kannada and 0.05 per cent in Odia.
