After Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigned on Saturday, the KJP celebrated the move as a victory for the student movement.
“Long live student power,” the party wrote in a post on the social media platform X.
Pradhan resigned on Saturday, after weeks of massive student protests in Delhi demanding his resignation over examination irregularities, particularly leaking of NEET-UG papers.
Read also | ‘To ensure that anti-national forces are not exploited’: What Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation letter says
Celebrations broke out at the Jantar Mantar protest site after the resignation was announced. A video clip from the site shows the students with Dibek joyfully celebrating the decision.
In a message in Hindi addressed to the country’s youth and published on the X website, Pradhan said he took moral responsibility for the developments surrounding the medical entrance exam while defending the government’s handling of the crisis.
“From day one, I accepted responsibility and never backed down from this situation,” Pradhan wrote. He said that as soon as irregularities were discovered in the NEET-UG exam conducted on May 3, 2026, the Narendra Modi government immediately transferred the investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), canceled the exam, announced and conducted a new exam. The re-examination conducted on June 21 was successfully conducted through a “whole-of-government approach”, involving the Centre, state governments and district administrations, the former minister said.
“An attempt to mislead”
At the same time, he claimed that “individuals in responsible positions” attempted to mislead students during the controversy, saying those efforts caused him “profound suffering.”
Read also | Dharmendra Pradhan resigns as Education Minister amid widespread uproar
He did not identify any individuals or organisations, although he attacked opposition leader Rahul Gandhi in the past few days.
Pradhan said that the events of the past ten days saddened him, but stressed that the issue was “not a matter of personal prestige.”
Instead, he said his decision came out of the need to protect students and preserve national unity.
“In view of the situation that has arisen in Jantar Mantar and across the country, and to ensure that anti-national forces do not take advantage of it, that the unity of the country remains intact, that the future of a single student does not get entangled in legal complications, and that our children devote their time to study and build their careers, I have tendered my resignation to the honorable Prime Minister,” he wrote. He called for not allowing young people to fall into the “trap of misinformation and confusion.”
