NEET-UG grace marks given to 1,563 candidates withdrawn

New Delhi : Amid a raging row over the NEET-UG examination, the Centre told the Supreme Court on Thursday it has cancelled the grace marks given to 1,563 candidates who took the examination for admission to MBBS and other such courses. They will have the option to either take a re-test on June 23 or forgo the compensatory marks awarded to them for loss of time.

Refusing to stall the counselling for NEET-UG, 2024, scheduled to commence from July 6, the top court made it clear that the admission of successful candidates to medical colleges and other institutions will be subject to the outcome of the petitions which have sought reliefs like cancellation of the examination held on May 5 on grounds of question paper leak and other malpractices.

A vacation bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta termed as "fairly reasonable" the decision to cancel the grace marks awarded to 1,563 candidates on the recommendation of a panel set up to look into the grievances voiced by the petitioners. The National Testing Agency (NTA) conducts the all India pre-medical entrance test.

At the outset, lawyer Kanu Agarwal, appearing for the Centre and the NTA, said the committee set up to look into the grievances decided on June 12 to "allay the fears of the students". It was of the view that the grace marks be withdrawn and replaced with an option of re-test for these candidates which will be conducted on June 23.

A notification to this effect will be issued during the day. He said the committee was of the view that the award of grace marks on grounds of loss of time while taking the test resulted in a "skewed situation" as it had to be limited only to the questions that remained un-attempted.

After examining all aspects, the panel concluded that it would be appropriate to recommend cancellation of scorecards of these beneficiary candidates. The results of the re-test will be declared on June 30 and the counselling for admissions to MBBS, BDS, and other courses will start on July 6, the Centre said. Lawyer J Sai Deepak, appearing for Alakh Pandey, the chief executive of EdTech firm ‘Physics Wallah’, assailed the random award of grace marks and said the option of re-test be given to all those students who could not approach the court alleging loss of time.

The bench declined the plea saying that it cannot expand the scope of the case to those who had not approached the court. The bench issued notices to the Centre and the NTA on three petitions and tagged them with the pending pleas. It said they all will be taken up together on July 8 after the summer vacation.