NEET-UG 2024 Row: Supreme Court Says NTA Must Avoid "Flip-Flops"

The Supreme Court on Friday said that the National Testing Agency must avoid the "flip flops" it made in relation to the NEET-UG 2024 examination. The apex court noted that such "flip-flops" in a national exam do not serve the interests of the students and added that the expert committee must rectify the deficiencies in the exam system.

The Supreme Court bench, comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, was pronouncing the detailed judgment, giving the reasons for its recent order, which refused to cancel the NEET-UG exam. "We have said that NTA must now avoid the flip flops which has happened now because it does not serve well. These issues such as rear door being kept open in strong room etc, then granting compensatory marks, then grace marks which led to 44 getting 720/720. We have highlighted all errors of NTA and thus committee should identify and rectify these," the Supreme Court said, as quoted by Bar and Bench. 

At the same time, the top court reiterated that there was no systemic breach in the NEET UG 2024 exam beyond Hazaribagh and Patna. On July 23, the Supreme Court refused to order a re-examination. Meanwhile, the Court has also given additional directions to an expert committee, which was constituted by the central government on June 22. LiveLaw reported that the committee has been asked to formulate a Standard Operating Procedure in connection with the timeline for registration, change of exam centres, sealing and storage of OMR sheets. The Supreme Court has asked the committee to prepare a report by September 30.