The Supreme Court has adjourned the NEET-UG 2024 paper leak case hearing till July 22 (Monday). The CJI DY Chandrachud said, 'Will resume the hearing at 10.30 am, so that the hearing can be concluded by noon.' The arguments in the apex court today (July 18) was on the nature of paper leak and the gap between the breach occurred and the exam.
The CJI led bench listened to around 38 petitions on exam cancellations. The apex court earlier on July 15 adjourned the hearing and gave time to petitioners to file their responses to affidavits by Centre and National Testing Agency (NTA).
The NTA on its July 11 affidavit denied mass malpractice in NEET-UG 2024 exam. The affidavit cited IIT Madras data analytics report which shows that there is neither any indication of mass malpractice nor a set of candidates benefited from abnormal scores.
NTA asked to publish full results by July 20
In today's (July 18) hearing, senior advocate Narendra Hooda, representing the petitioner, called for the results of all students to be declared to bring in some transparency. Then, the Solicitor General argued that the entire results are not published, and it is the personal property of the students. Finally, SC advised NTA to public NEET-UG full results city-wise and centre-wise. Bench also asked the testing agency to mask the identity of the candidates and publish the NEET-UG results on their website by July 20.
CBI detains 4 AIIMS Patna Medical Students
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has detained four students of AIIMS Patna in connection with the question paper leak in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (Undergraduate), also known as NEET-UG, people familiar with the matter said on July 18 (Thursday). CBI team carried out searches at the rooms of the four medical students of the 2021 and 2022 batches, confiscated their electronic devices and detained them for questioning.
The move comes days after CBI arrested Pankaj Kumar (alias Aditya), a 2017-batch civil engineer from Jamshedpur’s National Institute of Technology from Patna, and Rajkumar Singh alias Raju from Hazaribagh in Jharkhand.
Key man of solver gang sent to CBI custody
A special court in Patna has sent Pankaj Kumar, the main accused in the NEET-UG paper leak case, to 14-day CBI custody. Kumar allegedly stole the exam paper from the NTA's trunk in Jharkhand's Hazaribah. The CBI is investigating Kumar's role, connections, and financial transactions. His accomplice, Raju Singh, and several others, including educators and a journalist, have also been arrested. The leak has been linked to the notorious Sanjeev Kumar solver gang.