Five women were arrested in Kerala for allegedly forcing girl students, who appeared for medical entrance exam NEET, to remove their bra during frisking even as a fact-finding committee was constituted to look into the allegations.
Earlier, the National Testing Agency (NTA) rubbished the claims of a 17-year-old student that she was asked to remove her innerwear on Sunday saying the exam centre superintendent has informed that the complaint is "fictitious" and filed with wrong intentions.
While three of the arrested women worked for an agency hired by the NTA, two worked for the private educational institution at Ayur in Kollam where the incident happened.
The state police registered a case based on the complaint of the girl, who alleged that she was asked to remove her bra before she could be permitted to appear for the eligibility test. The NTA, which conducts the test, set up the panel after the Kerala government took up the issue with the Centre seeking strong action.
Union minister V Muraleedharan and other public representatives from Kerala also met Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan regarding the issue.
The arrest followed protests that began on July 18. The protests intensified and turned violent on Tuesday in Kerala's southern region of Kollam.
The personnel reportedly objected to the metallic hook in the innerwear.
Taking note of the allegation, the Union Ministry of Education (MoE) said that it has been brought to its notice through various media reports that an incident allegedly happened in one of the centres of NEET (UG)-2022 in Kerala. Accordingly, the Ministry said, a fact-finding committee was constituted by the NTA to ascertain the facts in detail.
"Further action will be taken based on the report of the fact-finding committee which will visit Kollam," a senior MoE official said.
The panel will visit Kollam to ascertain the facts.
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The Kerala Women's Commission, on its part, also registered a case based on complaints it received. An agency hired by NTA, in Kollam, for purposes including carrying out frisking, allegedly asked the girl students to remove their innerwear.
The complainant was the 17-year old girl. Several other girl students made similar allegations, though they have not separately filed police complaints.