After the successful conduction of the NEET UG retest for students who got ‘grace marks’, now over 50 NEET 2024-qualified students, including several who have been ranked first, have petitioned in the Supreme Court seeking a direction to restrain the Centre and the National Testing Agency (NTA) from cancelling the controversy-ridden exam.
The National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test-Undergraduate (NEET-UG) is conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) for admissions to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and other related courses in government and private institutions across the country. NEET-UG, 2024 was held across 4,750 centres on May 5 and around 24 lakh candidates appeared in the exam.
Allegations of irregularities, including paper leaks, have led to protests in several cities and sparring between rival political parties.
“The Hon’ble court may further direct the respondents (Centre and the NTA) not to re-conduct NEET-UG … as that would not only be unreasonable and harsh for the honest and hardworking students but also would lead to the infringement of the Right to Education and therefore violative of Article 14 (right to equality) of the Constitution.” quoted the news agency.
The plea sought a direction to the Centre and the NTA to identify and punish the examinees who adopted unfair means, identify the centres and take appropriate action where any “compromise to the established guidelines for NEET-UG 2024 examinations has been done.”