On Friday, the Supreme Court once again rejected a request to halt the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (undergraduate) or NEET-UG 2024 counselling process. The National Testing Agency (NTA), which conducts the exam, has been informed.
The new pleas and the ongoing cases have been flagged by a vacation bench of Supreme Court Justices Vikram Nath and SVN Bhatti, which will be heard on July 8.
In response to a plea by the NTA, the top court on Thursday granted the transfer of petitions related to the NEET-UG 2024 exam from the high courts to the Supreme Court. A vacation bench has also halted sessions in various high courts. The Supreme Court reaffirmed that the counselling procedure will continue.
In response to a petition filed by some students who claimed to have lost 45 minutes during their NEET-UG exam appearance at the Meghalaya Centre, the Supreme Court has also sent notices to the NTA and the Centre. The students were asked to be included in the group of 1,563 students who received grace marks and were given the opportunity to retake the exam on June 23. The pleas are scheduled for a hearing on July 8 by the Supreme Court.
The NEET-UG 2024 exam was conducted on May 5, and the results were released on June 4, ahead of its scheduled announcement date of June 14. Up to 67 students had topped the exam with a perfect score of 720, provoking protests claiming irregularities and paper leaks.
Students wishing to retake the exam have filed petitions in court. For more than 1,500 students who received “grace marks,” the Supreme Court has granted permission to retake the exam.
On June 13, the NTA informed the Supreme Court of cancelling the scorecards for 1563 applicants who obtained “grace marks” in the NEET-UG 2024 exam. The candidates would then have the choice to either lose the time-lost compensatory marks or retake the exam on June 23, the results of which would be announced before June 30. Lawyers for the Centre and the National Testing Agency (NTA) were informed by a vacation bench that any negligence of this nature had to be taken very seriously.
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