Student Suicides: NTF interim report flags impact of NEET, JEE-type exams on mental health

The National Task Force on mental health has noted that impact of “high-stakes examinations”, such as the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET UG) for medicine and Joint Entrance Examination (JEE Main) for engineering, on student mental health in its interim report, made public earlier this week.

The NTF on mental health was set up by the Supreme Court last year, after two suicide deaths of Dalit students at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi in close succession. Its interim report was submitted late last year and in 2026, the SC issued a series of directions based on it.

Careers360 had earlier reported on the directions – all aimed at preventing student suicides – and covered different aspects of the problem, from recruitment and caste discrimination to scholarships and attendance.

The report also looks at the pressures medical students are under in general. “In the case of professional institutions, the pressure is too much, like in medicine for instance. When you go to slightly higher levels, like residency, students face problems like sleep deprivation. Many times, scholarships for Dalit, Adivasi or minority students are not released on time which creates pressure,” NTF chief Justice S Ravindra Bhat had told Careers360 in an interview.

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NTA report ‘barely acknowledges’ NEET, JEE exam impact

The Interim Report, finally made public on Monday, notes the impact of high-stakes entrance exams like NEET and JEE Main.

The ministry of education had furnished the report of the High Level Committee of Experts – the Radhakrishnan Committee – set up to review the functioning of the National Testing Agency (NTA) and its exams after the 2024 paper leaks.

The NTF’s interim report says: “Previous reports on student mental health have highlighted a fundamental tension between “High Stake Examinations” (HSEs) such as the JEE in terms of their very structure, on the one hand, and the effects of these examinations on students and their mental health, on the other. The NEET report barely acknowledges what such HSEs are doing to ideas of knowledge and learning in the face of the pressure of cracking MCQs in a highly competitive context.”

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Caste discrimination in exams, ranks, classes

But the impact of the exams and NEET and JEE Main counselling processes carry well into the candidates’ lives as students, as the task force’s own survey found. Medical students informed the NTF that NEET results include the "admission category" – that is, whether they secured admission through reservation for historically-marginalised communities – and remain publicly-accessible online. According to the report, senior students frequently asked newcomers about their ranks, which many interpreted as attempts to determine caste backgrounds.

“The experience of higher education for students was…marked by deep-rooted social discrimination,” observes the task force in its report, listing among its forms “caste identification by NEET-UG and JEE ranks” and “caste-based humiliation and discrimination in terms of admission, grading, language gaps, and faculty attention, though it was common for faculty to claim that caste was not an issue on their campus”.

The NTF lists Radhakrishnan panel’s suggestions for reform – “pen and paper exams”, online versions , spreading examinations over a longer duration, allowing multiple attempts. “It also suggests improving preparation for HSEs at the school level especially for disadvantaged regions and groups”, says the NTF interim report.

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But with regard to the panel’s suggestions on mental health specifically, the NTF is sceptical. “When it comes explicitly to mental health, they suggest building into the NTA system a mechanism for feedback from students and parents. However, given the structure of the NTA and its huge mandate, it is unlikely that it can take on the entirely different burden of handling student mental health issues.”

Medical students stretched ‘beyond human limits’

Of all the students to respond to the NTF’s survey , 75% were pursuing undergraduate programmes and of this section, 6% were in medical, nursing and allied health science courses.

“Strict attendance policies; demanding schedules, and academic and clinical overload (medical and allied fields); on-call hours for medical students stretching well beyond mandated as well as human limits” were among the complaints in the feedback the NTF received.

“Medical students' on-call hours are stretched well beyond prescribed limits – going as far as 36-48 hours at a go - to the point of them going without much sleep or food for days,” it states.

At one college, “even serious illnesses, hospitalisation and suicide attempts were not accepted as grounds for leave despite the submission of medical documents”.

Nursing colleges were found to have some of the harshest attendance rules, including 100% attendance mandates in Delhi and 85-90% requirements in parts of southern India, the report adds. It points out that in one nursing college, students were required to deposit their phones daily following a recent suicide incident, leaving them disconnected from family and friends.

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Further, it cites a 2023 online survey of undergraduate students at a Kerala medical college which found “33.7% lifetime prevalence of suicidal ideation” and “15.2% had recent suicidal ideation”.

Suicide deaths in medical, dental, nursing colleges

According to data compiled by the task force from media reports, between January 1 and August 31, 2025, a total of 198 student suicides were reported from higher educational institutions, of which 47 were from medical institutions, including 16 nursing students, two allied health science students and one paramedical student. "The data reveal small but significant patterns of suicide clusters within certain institutions and regions," the report stated.

The National Medical Commission’s (NMC) data, submitted to the NTF, showed a total of 31 medical students had taken their own lives over three years – 15 in 2022, four in 2023 and 12 in 2024. Of these, 18 were undergraduate medical students, the report added.

Additionally, the Dental Council of India (DCI) – now replaced by the National Dental Commission – informed the task force that a second-year BDS student from Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, died by suicide on August 12, 2024. The NMC reported that “all medical colleges generally have psychiatry departments that offer mental health services. However documentation regarding student specific counselling is limited and data regarding the number of UG and PG students availing counselling services in the last three years is not available,” says the NTF’s interim report. The erstwhile DCI simply told the NTF that the law underpinning it had no provision for mental health counselling.

Medical students were identified as a particularly “vulnerable group”. Of the 47 the NTF counted, 24 were MBBS students; 11 MD/MS students; four each of BDS and BHMS; two of BAMS, and one each of DNB and veterinary sciences.

The report found that 28 of the 47 cases occurred in government medical colleges, while five cases were reported from various All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).

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Reported reasons included “academic stress", "ragging and peer harassment”, “being caught cheating or low attendance”, "harassment by faculty, administration or thesis guides", "dissatisfaction with chosen course" and "depression and other mental health challenges”.

The report also highlighted concerns about infrastructure and living conditions. Medical students in Delhi and affiliated colleges of a southern state university described deteriorating hostel facilities . Students reported "rundown rooms, washrooms and unhygienic living conditions – not fit for anyone to live."

Need measures ‘beyond conventional counselling’

Drawing from extensive consultations and feedback, the report noted that students strongly favoured independent and anonymous grievance mechanisms.

The task force's findings suggest that student mental health challenges in medical education are “deeply intertwined with academic pressures, institutional culture, discrimination, inadequate support systems and fears of administrative backlash, requiring structural reforms beyond conventional counselling measures”.