The Center notified the Supreme Court today that it has chosen to withdraw the grace marks granted to 1563 students in relation to the NEET-UG 2024 issue. These candidates will be notified of their revised scores (without the grace marks) and will be offered the opportunity to participate in a re-test, as disclosed by the Union Government's counsel in court.

If those students opt not to participate in the re-test, their scores from the exam conducted on May 5 will be considered instead.

Advocate Kanu Agarwal, representing the Union Government, informed a vacation bench consisting of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta that the decision was made by the panel appointed by the National Testing Agency (NTA) on June 12 to "address the concerns of the students".

Agarwal stated that the Court observed that awarding compensatory marks to 1563 students solely based on loss of time created a "biased situation,"  as the grace marks should have been restricted to the questions that were left unanswered.

After examining all aspects, the committee concluded that it would be appropriate to recommend canceling the scorecards of the 1563 students.

Taking note of these facts, the bench dictated the following order :

"The petitioner who had appeared for NEET-UG 2024 has raised a grievance regarding the grant of compensatory marks to 1563 candidates using the normalisation formula where, at the examination centres, the candidates who were not allowed 3 hours 20 minutes time admissible to them were permitted to take their examination for lesser time. The compensatory marks have been awarded based on the recommendation of a Grievance Redressal Committee relying upon a judgment of this Court in the case of Disha Panchal vs.Union of India and others.

This award of compensatory marks was challenged. The National Testing Agency constituted another committee to reconsider the issue and gave its recommendation on the award of compensatory marks. The subsequent committee held meetings on 10, 11 and 12th June 2024 and has made recommendations which have been placed before us.

According to the recommendations, it has been suggested that the score-cards of the affected 1563 candidates issued on June 4, 2024 will stand cancelled and withdrawn. These affected 1563 candidates will be informed of their actual scores without compensatory marks.

The Court also noted the statement of Senior Advocate Naresh Kaushik, representing the NTA, that the re-test would be officially announced today and is anticipated to take place on June 23. The results of the re-test will be released by June 30 to ensure that the counselling, scheduled for July 6, can proceed as planned.

Recording the positions of the Union and the NTA, the Court disposed of one petition challenging the grant of grace marks. Additionally, the Court issued notice on another petition alleging a paper leak during the exam and consolidated it with similar petitions scheduled for hearing on July 8.

Briefly stated, the court was dealing with 3 petitions filed challenging the NEET-UG, 2024 results.The Supreme Court issued notice on another petition filed before the declaration of the NEET-UG results on June 4, seeking cancellation of the NEET-UG 2024 test due to alleged paper leak. Noting the impact on the exam's integrity, the Court requested a response from the NTA regarding the allegations of paper leak by July 8. However, the Court declined to grant the request for a stay on the counselling process.

Previously, on June 8, the NTA and Union Education Ministry announced the establishment of a four-member committee tasked with reviewing the results of more than 1,500 candidates who received "grace marks" to offset the time lost during the NEET-UG 2024 exam.