NEET-UG 2024: Supreme Court Raises Doubts On Nation-Wide Retest

The Supreme Court observed on Thursday that it is now an established fact that there was a breach in the sanctity of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test—Undergraduate 2024 exam at Patna and Hazaribagh. However, the court questioned whether this would be enough to order a nation-wide retest.

During the hearing, the petitioners told the top court that the National Testing Agency, in tandem with IIT Madras, has run a data analysis process of the 23 lakh students who sat in the exam and has demonstrated a bell curve pertaining to the distribution of marks. This shows that there was no abnormality in the distribution of marks in the exam, the NTA has said.

However, the petitioners have stated that it is impossible to detect an abnormality through this data analysis, as the data is too large and any granular variation cannot be detected through this data.

Citing the IIT Madras Data Analytics Report, which says that an overall increase in the marks of the students is attributed to a 25% reduction in the syllabus, the petitioners argued that this is not painting the true picture as there was, in fact, an increase in the syllabus in some portions.

Disputing the fact of malpractices in the exam, the NTA placed on record that the first 100 candidates are distributed across 95 centres in 56 cities within 18 states, which shows a wide variation in distribution. The NTA stated that a leak of the paper would have resulted in spikes from a few centres.

Further, petitioners told the top court that the question paper was circulated on a Telegram channel one day prior to the examination, and given the nature of social media, it is impossible to accurately determine the precise quantum of the leak.

In light of this, the court noted that the individual who leaked the paper likely did so for financial gain, which raises the question as to why they would then distribute the question paper widely.

Lastly, the NTA informed the top court that there was not a leak but rather a breach in a specific centre in Hazaribagh. It happened early in the morning on May 5, between 8 a.m. and 9:23 a.m. In addition, the NTA's counsel stated that the students had only two hours to memorise the solved questions. That's why, out of the 18 students under investigation, only one would have possibly gotten admission, but he too will now face debarment.

After hearing all the arguments, the top court ordered the NTA to publish the marks of students on the website by 12 p.m. on Saturday and further directed them to release the marks city- and centre-wise.

The final hearing in the case will now take place on Monday, July 22.

After the NEET-UG 2024 results were declared on June 4, widespread allegations of irregularities and demands for a re-examination echoed across the country. Over 24 lakh candidates across 4,750 centres in 571 cities, including 14 overseas venues, took the examination.

When the NTA unveiled the results, a staggering 67 students had secured the top rank, including six from the same examination centre in Haryana. This immediately led to allegations of the inflation of marks.

Additionally, the NTA awarded grace marks to 1,563 students due to their lack of sufficient time to complete the test and a question that allegedly had two correct answers. The NTA came under scrutiny for this process of awarding grace marks, which followed a normalisation formula, as it did not proactively notify students of their grace marks at the time of award; instead, it acted in response to their protests.

On June 8, Subodh Kumar Singh, the director general of the NTA, said that the agency had decided to form a four-person, high-powered committee to revisit the grievances faced by 1,600 candidates across six centres and allay fears in the minds of 23 lakh students. However, he claimed that the integrity of the exam was not compromised.

Since then, grace marks awarded to these students have been cancelled and they have already been afforded the opportunity to either appear for a retest or accept their scorecards after the deletion of these grace marks.

During the last hearing, the apex court said that it was an undeniable fact that the leak took place. However, the court observed that ordering a retest in an exam of this magnitude should be an option of last resort.