On a day when President Droupadi Murmu talked tough on examination papers leak during her address in Parliament on Thursday, a series of development related to the raging controversy took place including the first arrest made by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the NEET paper leak case.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has asked the National Testing Agency (NTA) to apprise it if there was a time limit for raising grievances regarding the OMR sheets provided to the candidates who appeared in NEET-UG 2024.
The Delhi High Court too sought response from the NTA to a petition by a NEET candidate alleging ‘out of syllabus’ question in the entrance examination. In another development, Opposition leaders under the banner of INDIA Bloc in its Parliament strategy meeting on Thursday evening decided to raise the NEET and NET paper leaks issue in both the Houses of Parliament on Friday.
Continuing their protests on Thursday, members of NSUI (Congress’s students’ wing) barged into the NTA office in Okhla, raising slogans of “shut down NTA”.
After taking over the investigation, CBI made its first arrests in the NEET-UG paper leak case in Bihar, detaining two individuals from Patna, identified as Manish Kumar and Ashutosh. Both were produced before a special court in Patna which sent them to judicial custody. The CBI has registered six FIRs in the NEET paper leak case.
Before the CBI arrests, the police had also taken at least nine person into custody in Bihar, Maharashtra and Delhi. These included an aspirant who said he and a few others had got a copy of the question paper a day before the exam.
According to officials, Manish Kumar and Ashutosh Kumar allegedly provided safe premises to the aspirants before the examination where they were given leaked papers and answer keys. The two men had been called by the agency for questioning on Thursday and they were arrested after that.
The agency in its preliminary investigation found that Ashutosh Kumar had allegedly taken ‘Learn Boys Hostel and Play School’ in Patna on rent from where the Economic Offence Unit of Bihar Police had recovered half-burnt question papers of National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate).
The central probing agency has also found that Ashutosh Kumar knew that the premises was being used for providing question papers to NEET aspirants. About Manish Kumar, they said, that he allegedly struck deals with candidates who were ready to pay money for getting the question papers in advance. He then brought these candidates to the hostel where they were provided with the paper and the answer key, they said.
A vacation bench of Justices Manoj Misra and SVN Bhatti of the Supreme Court, which issued notice to the NTA on a fresh plea filed by a private coaching centre and few NEET candidates, tagged the petition with the pending matters and listed it for hearing on July 8. Senior advocate R Basant, appearing for the coaching institute and the candidates, submitted that a few students, who have appeared for the examination, have not got the OMR sheets.
The bench at the outset pointed out to Basant as how can a private coaching institute file an Article 32 petition in the Supreme Court and what kind of fundamental rights of the institution are affected. Counsel appearing for the NTA submitted that the OMR sheets have been uploaded on the website and given to the candidates. The bench asked him whether there is any time limit for raising the grievance of OMR sheets. The NTA counsel said that he needs to take instructions and sought listing of the petition along with the pending matters. “We will file a short reply by then to the query,” he said.
Basant pointed out that there is no set procedure or time limit to raise the grievance and therefore as an interim relief the candidates are seeking grant of OMR sheets. The bench then issued notice and tagged the petition with the pending matters while asking the counsel for NTA to file a short written reply to the court’s query on time limit.
In a related matter, the Delhi High Court has sought the stand of the NTA on a petition by a NEET candidate alleging ‘out of syllabus’ question in the entrance examination. The petitioner claimed one question in the physics section was based on ‘radioactivity’ when ‘radioactivity topic’ was not a part of the syllabus for this year’s NEET-UG. The petitioner also alleged a “manifest error” with respect to another question for which NTA declared the “incorrect option” as the right answer.
The NEET-UG is conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) for admissions to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and other related courses in government and private institutions across the country. This year’s examination was conducted on May 5 at 4,750 centres in 571 cities, including 14 abroad. Over 23 lakh candidates appeared for the test.
