Why has NEET returned to controversy once more? How has NEET repeatedly encountered paper leak accusations? Why do paper leak fears continue despite NTA’s safeguards? What reforms were suggested after the 2024 dispute? Can NEET transition to a computer-based format?
Nine days after almost 22 lakh medical aspirants appeared for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), which opens the path for admission to medical colleges, they received an unpleasant surprise. On May 12, the National Testing Agency (NTA) announced that the examination had been ‘compromised,’ and that a re-test would be conducted.
The move has triggered outrage among students nationwide, with the Federation of All India Medical Association (FAIMA) approaching the Supreme Court with a plea to either replace the NTA or undertake sweeping structural reforms.
What controversies has NEET encountered over the years?
The move to hold a re-examination for nearly 22 lakh students is unprecedented in NEET’s history, but anxieties regarding paper leaks are not unfamiliar. In 2024, the declaration of the NEET-UG results coincided with the announcement of national election outcomes. For the first time, 67 out of the top 100 scorers secured full marks. By comparison, only two students achieved full marks in 2023, while none did so in 2022. A large concentration of students obtaining full marks led to severe rank inflation, with several aspirants who had secured high scores competing for a single seat in reputed medical colleges.
In 2024, 13 lakh students qualified and were competing for nearly 1.1 lakh MBBS seats across government and private medical colleges. Claims of a paper leak later surfaced, with investigations revealing that 155 students had allegedly gained from leaked question papers. Students had then sought a re-examination, but their demand went unheard.
Why has NTA’s ‘Zero Error’ assurance fallen short?
With repeated incidents of paper leaks emerging year after year, the NTA appears not to have learned from its troubled past. The revamp of NTA largely remained symbolic. After the 2024 controversy, IAS officer Subodh Kumar Singh, then Director General of the NTA, was removed from the position and shifted to the Ministry of Steel as Additional Secretary. He is presently serving as Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh.
Following his transfer, the NTA functioned without a full-time chief for more than a year, with retired 1985-batch IAS officer Pradeep Singh Kharola holding ‘additional interim charge’. In March this year, former IndiaAI Mission CEO Abhishek Singh assumed charge of the NTA and declared that there would be a ‘Zero Error, Zero Tolerance’ policy.
After the NEET-UG 2026 examination was conducted on May 3, the NTA highlighted on social media the “smooth manner” in which the exam had been organised across 5,432 centres, with 22.79 lakh candidates appearing. It stated that over two lakh personnel were engaged in conducting the examination.
The agency also asserted that there was end-to-end secure handling of confidential materials under sealed protocols, GPS-enabled vehicles with police escorts for the transport of examination material, CCTV surveillance at all examination centres (up to 1,50,000), with feeds connected to centralised control rooms, mandatory frisking through high-sensitivity metal detectors before entry, with reinforced manpower and equipment at every centre, Aadhaar-based biometric authentication to prevent impersonation and real-time monitoring through centralised control systems.
Mr. Abhishek Singh informed The Hindu that the NTA had blocked 120 Telegram channels for circulating fake question papers and rumours, aimed at cheating candidates.
Despite these precautions, investigations by the Rajasthan Police revealed that a “guess paper” containing 120 out of 410 questions from the final examination had allegedly been circulating for nearly a month before the exam, a major lapse by the NTA.
What did the Radhakrishnan panel recommend?
Following the NEET-UG 2024 controversy, the Ministry of Education constituted a high-level committee headed by former ISRO chairman K. Radhakrishnan. However, the committee’s recommendations were not implemented in letter and spirit by either the NTA or the Ministry.
The report, submitted in October 2024, identified the pen-and-paper testing (PPT) model as ‘a major security risk.’ It recommended a shift to Computer-Based Testing (CBT) format, similar to the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Main, which is also conducted by NTA. JEE Main sees participation of 13 to 15 lakh students annually and is conducted over four to five days.
The committee also proposed Computer-assisted Secure PPT, where encrypted papers are delivered digitally to exam centres and printed locally immediately before the test. This removes the vulnerable printing-and-transit phase. NTA has made no claim of implementing it. Instead, it relied on GPS vehicles and police escorts.
Mr. Abhishek Singh stated that the NTA has the capacity to conduct CBT tests for only around 1.5 lakh students in a day. He added that shifting NEET to CBT mode is a ‘high-level ministry call’ involving both the Ministries of Health and Education.
In 2024, the NTA floated a tender to expand its capacity of computer labs, but the process could not be finalised. In 2026, the NTA has around 552 CBT centres, which are primarily used for JEE and CUET examinations. Since the Radhakrishnan Committee report was released in 2024, the NTA has not been able to expand its infrastructure to add more centres.
Multiple proposals to conduct NEET-UG exams online were sent to the Ministry of Education, but without result, officials at the NTA told The Hindu. “Talks for conducting the NEET-UG in CBT mode, have been ongoing for at least five years now. The recent paper leak fiasco should serve as a wake-up call to change the format of the exams,” an official said.
The Ministry of Education has once again handed over the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation, as it had earlier in 2024 too. What emerged from the earlier probe into the NEET 2024 leak case?
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed chargesheets against 45 accused in the NEET-UG 2024 paper leak case between August and November 2024 before a special court for CBI cases in Patna. Candidates who allegedly benefited from the paper leak, along with impersonators, were shared with the Ministry of Education and NTA.
Initial reports stated that 36 arrests were made in connection with the case. However, there is no information on the status of the arrests and accused after the final chargesheet in November 2024.
With the CBI investigating the NEET-UG 2026 leak, the last official update in the 2024 case still states that “investigations are ongoing.”
What is the human cost of conducting a re-test on such a massive scale where the future of nearly 22.79 lakh aspirants is at stake?
The cancellation of the NEET-UG examination and the uncertainty surrounding fresh exam dates have caused distress to aspirants across India. Many students point out that this is the second such instance in two years.
Several students who had performed well in the examination are demoralised by the new developments. Vamika, a student from Delhi, told agencies that although her projected score was good, she was uncertain about how she would perform in the re-test. “The constant studying and pressure eventually wear you down,” she said.