The Supreme Court, today, during the hearing of cases alleging malpractices and paper leaks in the National Entrance-cum-Eligibility Test-Under Graduate Exam, 2024 (NEET-UG, 2024), asked IIT, Delhi to constitute an expert/committee to evaluate the correct answer to the question for which National Testing Agency has changed the answer according to old NCERT Books.

The Bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Misra ordered, "One of the questions in the NEET 2024 examination...In order to resolve this, as indicated above, four options were given as framed, for which students had to select one option. In order to resolve the issue as regards the correct answer to the above question, we are of the considered view that an expert opinion should be sought. We request IIT Delhi to constitute an expert team to formulate an opinion on to above question and to remit its opinion to the Registrar preferably by July 23, 2024."

The Bench made the order after a few counsels submitted that the answer to one question from Physics was changed to answer as given by the old NCERT although the rule of NEET says that the answer will be correct according to the new NCERT. She submitted, "May I just submit one thing, my primary prayer is that this question should be deleted and therefore everyone will be marked out of 716 marks or out of 179 questions...It is because of this question there is an increase in the Rank 1. The rule says that the latest edition of the NCERT, is going to be treated as the syllabus for NEET."

CJI said, "So in the alternative you want the answer of the question should be '(4)'."

CJI (After reading the question) said, "By giving marks to option two, you are going against your own rule...420774 attempted option 2 and 928379 attempted option 4...so 4.2 lacs students will lose 5 marks."

SG submitted, "We received representations from poor students that they used their elder siblings NCERT Books. The Books are passed down."

Counsel replied, "In the provisional answer key they gave the correct answer but later they changed and decided to give marks for option 2 as well."

Justice Misra said, "Two cannot be correct because the radioactive element is not stable. So the correct answer would have to be four."

Senior Advocate Narender Hooda appearing on behalf of the Petitioners submitted that the statements under Section 161 of the Code of Criminal Procedure as recorded by the Bihar Police suggest that the leak occurred on the night of May 4, 2024. He referred to the Statements of four persons i.e. Anurag Yadav, Nitesh Kumar, Amit Anand and Sikander Prasad.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta then said, "Please see Pg 132, Amit Anand, he is a middleman."

CJI said, "Just please see Pg 88...(reads statements) "Issi beech NEET ka parikshaa agya tha...charo ladko ko bulaya...4 ki ratri me bulaya...issi bich NEET ka pariksha aa gya...4 ladko ko NEET pariksha ka paper leak krwaya and ratwaya jaa rha tha..".

CJI remarks, "This indicates that the students were being asked to memorize on the night of the Fourth, which means that the leak had occurred prior to the Fourth....please see Pg 92...Amit Anand's statement is suggestive that the leaked question paper was available, which comes from the statements of Amit Anand."

The Bench remarked that there is no evidence to show whether the leak was widespread and not just at Hazaribagh and Patna.

Hooda then referred to the incident of Bahadurgarh and Jhajjar, where at one centre question paper from Canara Bank was distributed and candidates finished that question paper.

CJI asked the Counsel for NTA, "Are the banks not informed to not release the paper?...vault in charge has to be informed....how at Bahadurgarh, Canara Bank has given the paper. Candidates wrote the exam paper for three hours."

Counsel for NTA: "Students were allowed to give Canara Bank paper as it was of the same difficulty."

CJI asked, "How many centres the incorrect papers were withdrawn and SBI paper given?...How many centres are there in which Canara Bank Paper was completed? Please find out."

CJI then raised important questions, "1) How many centres were there where Canara Bank papers were distributed?; 2) Out of those centres, in how many centres booklets were replaced?; 3) Whether there were any centres which were evaluated on the basis of the Canara Bank question paper?; 4) Once the Canara Bank papers were evaluated, how did candidates fare?; 5) Why would you not declare the answer key of the Canara Bank? and How does the Bank person know that I am the right person who is authorised, there has to be a letter of authorization's identity."

Hooda referred to the data of various States. Hooda submitted, "In their system, they will simply fill up the address, People have gone from Godhra to Bengaluru. One incident is a girl who got 705 marks. She failed in 12th class and she is getting 30 out of 100 in chemistry and so on and so forth."

CJI asked, "How do you establish, that the paper leak, according to you, has spread all over the country?"

Hooda said, "Systems are so fragile which are being consistently compromised...everybody is private."

When Hooda repeated his arguments, Justice Pardiwala suggested, "There are two ways of looking at this problem. You all came here because of a paper leak. There is no escape from the fact that yes there has been a paper leak. Is it your argument that this systemic failure which you are talking about now led to...today we are trying to understand, we are trying to look into to what extent this leak precipitated in the entire country...These are two compartments, there are two components, whereas one really talks about the paper leak and to what extent the students took advantage of that leak."

(Advocate Nedumpara intervened) Justice Pardiwala said, "These are bad manners, bad. I am not very sophisticated like My Lord Chief Justice. You may feel bad, please, please. Three times I have said please. Quiet."

CJI also remarked, "Mr Hooda, in many professional exams, I don't want to name them, otherwise this will become another national story tomorrow, that you know in many professional examination, students do choose centres in a particular zone or whatever because there is a preception that the marking is little more lenient..."

Another counsel seeking a re-test appeared and referred to the judgment Tanvi Sarwal vs Central Board Of Secondary Education (2015) 6 SCC 573. "Here in this matter, the investigation was in process. Certain reports were before Your Lordships and came to a conclusion that we don't need to wait for the reports...So this was also a medical examination, AIPMT at that time when CBSE was conducting, before NEET came.", he said.

He read, "Having regard to the fact, that the course involved with time would yield the future generations of doctors of the country, who would be in charge of public health, their inherent merit to qualify for taking the course can by no means be compromised...We are aware, that the abrogation of the examination, would result in some inconvenience to all concerned and that same extra time would be consumed for holding a fresh examination with renewed efforts therefor. This however, according to us, is the price the stakeholders would have to suffer in order to maintain the impeccable and irrefutable sanctity and credibility of a process of examination, to assess the innate worth and capability of the participating candidates for being assigned inter se merit positions commensurate to their performance based on genuine and sincere endeavours."

Accordingly, the Petitioners concluded the arguments.

Several petitions were filed against the NEET-UG, 2024 exam, including Alakh Pandey alias Physics Wallah, alleging several malpractices and paper leaks and seeking directions for cancellation of exams. Notice was issued in several petitions and all the matters were tagged together seeking a reply from the NTA.

On July 21, 2024, the National Testing Agency ('NTA') filed an additional affidavit addressing the issue in respect of Prof. V. Kamakoti, Director, IIT Madras, orally raised by the Petitioners during the last date of hearing. The Petitioners alleged that the IIT-Madras report was not made based on complete data and there is a conflict of interest as the Director of IIT Madras is a Member of the NTA's Governing Body. NTA, in its additional affidavit, has denied the contention and submitted that the Director happens to be the ex-officio member of the General Body by virtue of IIT-JEE (Advance) Exam-2024 and the role of General Body is primarily confined to the "police making matters".

Previously, the Court had directed the NTA to publish the marks obtained by students along with their examination centres in the NEET-UG, 2024 before Friday i.e. July 19, 2024, while at the same time ensuring the identity of the students is masked. The NTA published all the data as directed by the Court on the portal on Friday.

Recently, the NTA has filed written submissions in reply to the note of the Petitioners/Applicants circulated by the Nodal Cousnel stating the list of dates of events and replying to the contentions.

The Centre has filed an additional affidavit stating that experts from IIT Madras in their analysis say that there is neither any indication of mass malpractice nor a localized set of candidates being benefitted leading to abnormal scores in the NEET-UG. The additional affidavit was filed in compliance with the directions issued on July 8, 2024, by the Supreme Court to answer several questions in the matters related to the NEET-UG, 2024 alleged paper leak and malpractices.

The Supreme Court had remarked that if the question paper was leaked in the NEET-UG, 2024 on social media or telegram channels, then it would be widespread, the integrity of the exam would be affected and such beneficiaries of the leak will have to be identified ruthlessly.

The NTA had filed a reply in the matter, stating that the candidates scoring full marks in the NEET-UG, 2024 was due to a reduction in the syllabus which was done to alleviate pressure. The Union of India had also filed a reply and said that in the absence of any proof of a large-scale breach of confidentiality in the NEET-UG, 2024, it would be irrational to scrap the examination.

The Court has also heard the petitions seeking CBI and ED probe in the matter.

The Court, on June 20, 2024, had also stayed the proceedings in various petitions filed across Rajasthan, Calcutta, and Bombay High Courts.

On June 14, 2024, The Court had also issued notice in the petition filed by the NTA seeking a transfer of pending petitions before various High Courts alleging the malpractices in NEET-UG. The Court, on June 13, 2024, had allowed the recommendations by the UOI and NTA, to conduct a re-examination for the 1563 candidates who were given compensatory marks in the NEET-UG, 2024.

Cause Title: Vanshika Yadav v. Union of India & Ors. (W.P.(C) No. 335/2024) and connected matters.

Chief Justice DY ChandrachudJustice JB PardiwalaJustice Manoj MisraNEETNEET UG

Aastha Kaushik