Supreme Court Denies Request to Delay NEET-PG Exam

New Delhi:

Rejecting a plea filed by a few students, the Supreme Court has declined to delay the NEET-PG exam set for Sunday and stated that it could not jeopardize the careers of nearly 2 lakh candidates. 

The entrance examination for post-graduate medical courses, initially planned for June 23, had already been rescheduled once as a precaution due to the controversy over the irregularities in NEET-UG. 

Requesting another postponement of the NEET-PG exam, the petitioners mentioned that many candidates assigned exam centers in cities where reaching was challenging. They claimed that the National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS), responsible for conducting the exam, had notified them of the city for the exam on July 31. 

On the other hand, information about the exam center was provided only on Thursday, just before the exam scheduled for Sunday, the students argued, also stating that the exam was supposed to happen in two sessions and the scoring normalization formula had not been disclosed yet. 

During the hearing on Friday, a bench comprising Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices Manoj Misra and JB Pardiwala stated that ordering a postponement just two days before the exam was not feasible. 

“How can we delay such an exam? Nowadays, everyone asks for postponements. It’s not a perfect world. We are not education experts,” remarked the court. 

Noting that 2 lakh students were anticipated to take the exam, the bench mentioned that they were not inclined to reschedule it based on a few candidates’ requests. 

“There are 2 lakh students and 4 lakh parents who will be impacted. We cannot endanger the careers of so many candidates just because of these petitioners,” the bench emphasized. 

Prior Postponement

On the eve of June 22, a day before NEET-PG was initially scheduled, the government had declared the postponement of the exam. This decision came amidst the uproar over NEET-UG paper leaks and followed the announcement of a change in the chief of the National Testing Agency, responsible for conducting the undergraduate medical exam. 

Expressing the need for a “comprehensive evaluation of the effectiveness of NEET-PG processes,” the government stated that the exam was postponed as a precautionary measure. 

Many candidates were caught off guard at the time, facing inconvenience as they had to travel to different cities for the exam. Some even brought their families along because they couldn’t leave their young children behind.