Mumbai: The Maharashtra government has urgently requested the cancellation of last month’s NEET exam, alleging significant injustices against students from the state due to its results.
Many candidates of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET-UG), conducted on May 5 across 4,750 centers in 571 cities, have previously claimed that inflated marks led to a record number of 67 candidates securing the top rank, including six from the same exam center in Haryana. The exam results were announced on June 4.
The National Testing Agency (NTA), however, refuted allegations of irregularities, citing changes in NCERT textbooks and the provision of grace marks for time lost at examination centers as factors contributing to higher scores among students.
Addressing the issue, Maharashtra’s Medical Education Minister Hasan Mushrif stated on Friday, “The NEET exams appear to have been conducted under questionable circumstances. The results have unfairly disadvantaged students from Maharashtra, barring them from securing admissions to MBBS courses in government or private colleges within the state.”
Mushrif noted that concerned parents of numerous students have approached him seeking resolution of this matter. “These results have inflicted injustices upon Maharashtra and must be promptly annulled. We intend to bring this issue to the attention of the National Medical Council (NMC),” he asserted.
The minister indicated that the government is contemplating legal recourse to address the situation.
NEET-UG serves as the qualifying exam for admissions to various medical and allied health sciences courses such as MBBS, BDS, BAMS, BSMS, BUMS, BHMS, and BSc (H) Nursing, encompassing over 80,000 MBBS seats across more than 540 medical colleges in India.
Earlier, the Congress had criticized the government over this issue. Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra called for a thorough investigation into students’ “valid grievances.”
“First, the NEET exam paper was allegedly leaked, and now students allege irregularities in the results. Serious concerns arise from reports of six students from the same center achieving a perfect score of 720 out of 720, alongside other discrepancies,” Gandhi remarked.
Highlighting the distressing aftermath of the results, Gandhi noted reports of tragic suicides among students nationwide and questioned the government’s apparent dismissal of the concerns raised by lakhs of students seeking transparency regarding alleged malpractices in NEET results.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin also voiced opposition to NEET, arguing that the entrance test undermines principles of social justice and federalism.
“The issues such as question paper leaks, concentration of top performers at specific centers, and the assignment of mathematically improbable marks under the guise of grace marks underscore the pitfalls of the current centralization by the Union government. These incidents underscore the necessity to restore the primacy of state governments and the school education system in determining criteria for admissions to professional courses,” he emphasized on X.
