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Synopsis

A petition has been filed before the Supreme Court of India under Article 32 of the Constitution seeking a direction to the National Testing Agency (NTA) not to pass any order amounting to cancellation of NEET-UG 2024 examination.

Furthermore, revaluation of the OMR sheets of all the candidates has been sought to ensure transparency of the examination process and address the concerns regarding alleged tampering and rank inflation and soaring rise in the number of toppers in NEET-UG 2024.

Arguing that cancellation of a national level examination only because of concerns raised by few will tantamount to severe injustice to several candidates who worked hard for this examination, the petitioners have submitted, "The alleged cancellation of examination, at this stage will have serious repercussions on the candidates who have thoroughly worked hard for the examination. The Petitioners propose to suggest that in view of the rank inflation this year, which is clear from the chart below, it is advisable to have revaluation of the scores rather than having a re-neet for all the candidates...".

It is additionally stated that lakhs of candidates have put in their hard work while preparing for the examination and any alleged act such as cancellation will severely prejudice the career of thousands of deserving candidates across the country and benefitting few who pray for cancellation of the examination.

The petitioners are being represented through Advocate Tanvi Dubey.

On June 14, the Supreme Court of India had also issued notice in a plea seeking CBI probe into the alleged leak of NEET UG entrance paper. Court sought responses from both NTA and Central government while clarifying that it is not going to stop the ongoing counselling process.

In another plea, Central government had informed the Supreme Court that the grace marks given to candidates who got less than the allotted time to write the NEET undergraduate exam 2024 have been cancelled.

A vacation bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta has further been told that these aggrieved candidates will be given the option to retake the exam if they wish to.

The Supreme Court has been flooded with pleas over the NEET UG 2024 examination. A fresh plea was also filed by Alakh Pandey, questioning the NTA's decision to award grace marks to 1563 candidates due to time loss in NEET -UG examination, leading to shooting up of overall merit list.

While dealing with a writ petition filed by Shivangi Mishra and others over the alleged leak of the NEET UG paper, a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Ahsanuddin Amanullah also issued notice to the National Testing Agency's (NTA) seeking its response saying the "sanctity of the exam seemed to have been affected".

Another plea has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking a fresh examination of NEET, held on May 5, 2024 for admission to medical colleges across the country, in view of alleged paper leak and other malpractices.

The court, however, had refused to stay the ongoing counselling for admissions. The plea seeking a direction for a fresh examination to admission to undergraduate courses in medical colleges across the country has also been fixed for hearing on July 8, when another such plea is scheduled to come up for consideration.

Case Title: MISHA NIKUNJ SHAH & ORS. vs. NATIONAL TESTING AGENCY & ORS.