NEET-UG 2024: Counselling Expected to Begin By End of July With Additional Seats, Claim Sources

New Delhi: The counselling for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test-Undergraduate (NEET-UG) 2024, which has been deferred, is expected to start by the end of July. However, the dates have not been notified yet. According to the reports by the news agency PTI, the counselling session was expected to begin in the first week of this month, but it was deferred amid ongoing paper leak row.

Earlier, in the month of June, the Supreme Court had refused to defer the counselling process after a petition had sought a direction to pause the process for two days.

Petitions Are Pending Before Supreme Court to Recall NEET-UG 2024 Results

Sources claimed that the process of issuing permission letters to some medical colleges was still underway and additional seats were likely to be added. “The date of counselling will be announced once the exercise gets over to ensure seats of the new colleges can be taken up in the first round itself,” an official source told PTI.

Amid calls for cancellation of the NEET-UG 2024 over alleged irregularities and question paper leaks, the Centre and the National Testing Agency (NTA) had told the Supreme Court on Friday that scrapping it without any proof of large-scale breach of confidentiality would be counterproductive as it could “seriously jeopardise” lakhs of honest candidates.

The Centre has filed an affidavit on a batch of petitions pending before the SC seeking direction to recall NEET-UG 2024 results and conduct the examination afresh.

The Ministry of Education said that prayers raised in the petitions for the cancellation of the exam and the re-test based on “surmises” and “conjectures” must be rejected.

In an affidavit in the SC, NTA had said that the alleged malpractices were only in Patna and Godhra centers and that the entire exam should not be canceled based on individual instances.

The court was also informed that a high-level panel has been set up to suggest measures for effective, smooth, and transparent conduct of the examinations by the NTA.

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the cases on July 8.

Only 52 % Candidates Appeared for Re-test

After massive uproar by NEET candidates and their parents over the exam results which met with significant disapproval from both parents and children, the NTA withdrew the grace marks awarded to 1,563 students and conducted a re-test on June 23 for them. Out of 1.563, only 812 candidates turned up for the re-test.

How NEET Row Surfaced

The results for the medical entrance examination were declared on June 4. The test was undertaken by around 24 lakh students on May 5. Soon after the exam, allegations of leakage of the NEET-UG paper surfaced. As many as 67 students got a perfect score of 720/720, unprecedented in NEET's history.

PM Modi Warns Culprits

Earlier, during his speech on Motion of Thanks to the President’s speech in the Parliament, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, referring to the alleged NEET scam, warned the accused involved in the alleged paper leak scam, saying that the government is working on a war-like scenario to take steps to bring the culprits to justice. PM Modi assured the country that the government is taking critical steps to address the NEET exam leak controversy adding that those messing with the Indian youth's future will not be spared.

PM Modi said, "I will tell every student of the country, every youth of the country that the government is very serious about preventing such incidents and we are taking one step after another to fulfill our responsibilities on a war footing. Those who play with the future of the youth will not be spared at all.”