GUWAHATI: The Supreme Court on Thursday, July 11 adjourned the hearing of petitions seeking the cancellation of the NEET-UG 2024 exam to enable the petitioners to file their responses to the affidavits filed by the Centre and the National Testing Agency on Wednesday.
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The next hearing will be on Thursday, July 18, according to reports.
The bench comprising CJI DY Chandrachud, Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra was hearing a clutch of petitions seeking the cancellation of the NEET-UG 2024 exam held on May 5 on account of alleged paper leak and unfair means.
The Centre in an affidavit filed on Wednesday denied any mass malpractice in the exam. It said that the data analytics done by the Indian Institute of Technology Madras indicated no abnormalities.
A bench led by the CJI on July 8 had sought the responses of the Centre/NTA on the extent of the paper leak and possible segregation of the wrongdoers from others.
The court said that if seperating the beneficiaries of fraud from the honest candidates was not possible then a re-test may be necessary, but it would be the last option considering the impact on nearly 24 lakh students.
The court had asked the Centre and NTA regarding the nature of the paper leak and steps taken to identify the beneficiaries of fraudulent practices. It asserted that the paper leak in the NEET-UG exam could not be denied, adding that what remained to be ascertained was if the nature of the leak was widespread or isolated, in order to decide the question of ordering a re-test.