NEET row: Supreme Court conditions re-examination on 'concrete footing'

After hearing over 40 petitions regarding alleged malpractices and irregularities pertaining to the NEET-UG, the Supreme Court stated on July 18 that a re-examination of NEET-UG 2024 could only be considered on "concrete footing" that the sanctity of the medical entrance test has been "affected" on a large scale.

The remark was made by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud. According to media reports, he told senior advocate Narendra Hooda who was representing the petitioners, that it must be made evident that the paper leak was "so systemic and affected the entire examination so as to warrant the cancellation of the entire examination".

During the hearing, the CJI said, "Merely because out of 23 lakh only 1 lakh will get admission, we cannot order a re-examination. Re-examination has to be on a concrete footing that the entire exam is affected."

Highlighting "social ramifications" of the paper leak controversy, the apex court prioritised the NEET hearing over cases related to Google vs Competition Commission of India (CCI) and income tax returns.

CJI Chandrachud said that "lakhs of students are waiting for an outcome in this matter", further asing Hooda regarding the number of seats in both government and private medical colleges in India. 

Hooda, in response, informed the bench that the number stood at 1,08,000, and argued that in the case of a retest, there would only be as many aspirants instead of 23 lakhs who had appeared earlier.

The Chief Justice also sought answers over candidates not falling under the 1,08,000 "legitimately". To this, the senior advocate said that the remaining 22 lakh aspirants would "like to have a chance".

"We cannot order a re-exam merely because they want to re-appear. It can happen only if the sanctity of the exam has been affected," CJI Chandrachud said.

The Centre and the National Testing Agency have opposed the demand for a retest, stating that the alleged malpractices and irregularities are localised and did not hamper the sanctity of the entire medical examination.

The Centre had earlier filed an affidavit, stating data analytics of the NEET-UG 2024 results conducted by IIT-Madras which showed that there was neither an indication of "mass malpractice" nor a localised set of candidates benefitting from the same and scoring unusually high marks.