On July 9, the Delhi High Court dismissed various petitions which had sought quashing of result of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) 2019 claiming that several questions had more than one correct answer.

Justice Anu Malhotra said the reliance placed by the medical aspirants on a previous verdict delivered by the division bench of the high court is wholly inapplicable here as the facts of that case are “not in pari materia (on the same subject or matter)” with the facts of this matter.

“The petitions and the accompanying applications are all dismissed,” the court said.

The court passed the common judgement on four separate but identical petitions by various medical aspirants who appeared in the NEET 2019.

The petitions sought quashing of the NEET under-graduate 2019 result which was declared on June 5 by the National Testing Agency (NTA).

They also sought that NTA be directed to declare the revised and corrected list of petitioners and give them full marks in relation to four questions.

The candidates submitted that during the course of examination, they realised there were multiple choice questions which had more than one correct answer.

Even after the answer key was put up by NTA, it was indicated that two question had two correct options, they said.

NTA, in its response, said the petitions were wholly misconceived as no fundamental or legal rights of the petitioners have been violated by the NTA.

As per the scheme of NEET UG, 2019 examination, the special experts appointed by it had duly considered the objection to the answer key issued for the exam and rejected it after finding no merits in it, it said.

Regarding the candidates’ claim on two questions, the authorities said that on inviting objections to the answer key published on May 29, the subject experts were of the opinion that the two questions had two correct options and marks should be granted to students who had opted for either of the two correct options.

On the basis of the report of the subject experts, marks have been granted to the candidates who had opted for either of the correct answers mentioned in the final revised answer key, it said.

The court had earlier sought response of the Centre, National Testing Agency and Medical Council of India, represented through advocate T Singhdev, on the petitions.

The National Testing Agency (NTA) was established by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development as an independent and self-sustained testing organisation to conduct entrance examinations.

Source: PTI

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