Xylem Learning Private Limited has filed a suit about NEET-UG 2024. On June 27, the Supreme Court has requested a response from the National Testing Agency (NTA) on the time limit for registering grievances about the OMR sheets. The petition, among other things, expressed issues with the allocation of OMR sheets to the students who took the test.
A Vacation Bench consisting of Justices Manoj Misra and S.V.N. Bhatti said at the beginning of the procedure that a coaching centre is the petitioner in this writ case.
“This is a 32 petition by instance of a coaching centre. What Fundamental right of yours is violated?., Justice Misra posed the question.
Justice Bhatti elaborated on this point by saying “This is one of the reasons where we see this role played by the coaching centres, bagpipers. They have hardly any role to play. Their obligation and duty…if they have discharged their service that is the end of the matter. They have not undertaken to see that everything that Centre is supposed to do it will be taken care by them.”
According to Senior Advocate R Basant, the petitioners include of students who were expected to get the OMR sheets. Asserting his request for temporary relief in the petition, he said that it is to get the OMR sheets since some pupils have not received them yet. The NTA lawyer refuted this claim by stating that the OMR sheets had been posted and distributed to the candidates.
Subsequently, the Court asked if there was a certain timeframe within which the grievance against the OMR sheets may be raised. “Typically, when OMR sheets are uploaded and grievances arise, there is a specific time limit.” The NTA’s Counsel said that he would verify the information. Nevertheless, Basant quickly asserted that there is no established protocol for raising an objection.
In the end, the Court issued the notice and associated it with similar petitions that were still pending.
The NEET-UG Examination 2024, conducted by NTA, is now under scrutiny. The test took place on May 5th of this year. A number of applications were submitted to the Supreme Court and several high courts, contesting the validity of this medical admission examination.
The petitioners have requested court action over the alleged paper leak, the granting of grace marks to compensate for time lost, and other irregularities or anomalies that took place during the administration of the NEET-UG Examination.
Earlier, the Court declined to postpone the counseling/seat allocation procedure, which is set to commence on July 6. In addition, the Court made verbal remarks stating that the admissions would be contingent upon the ultimate decision of the petitions. If the tests are invalidated, the counselling process will also be rendered invalid as a result.
The court expressed concern about a potential discrepancy in the conduct of the NEET-UG 2024 exams. It emphasised the need to thoroughly investigate even the slightest negligence, as candidates invest significant effort into this prestigious examination.
As a follow-up, on June 22, the Central Government assigned the CBI the task of investigating the suspected anomalies in the NEET (UG) Examination 2024.
The Ministry of Education acknowledged in a formal press statement that “certain cases of alleged irregularities/cheating/impersonation have been reported” in relation to the NEET UG test that was administered on May 5.
In addition, a re-test was administered on June 23 for a total of 1563 students who were granted grace marks. According to the reports, only 813 individuals, which is roughly 52% of the total, participated in the exam, while the rest were missing.
Cause Title : Xylem Learning Vs NTA., W.P.(C) No. 389/2024