Parliamentary panel had flagged NTA’s poor performance months before NEET-UG paper leak row

New Delhi:  Months before the NEET-UG paper leak controversy erupted, a parliamentary committee had observed that the National Testing Agency’s performance over the past few years had been unsatisfactory, noting that at least five of the 14 examinations it conducted were marred by paper leaks or other controversies.

Amid mounting scrutiny over the NEET-UG issue, a CBI team visited the NTA headquarters on Wednesday to collect documents linked to the examination, while arrests were also made in Rajasthan.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, chaired by Congress Rajya Sabha MP Digvijaya Singh, had, in a report submitted six months before the NEET-UG paper leak, urged the NTA to improve its functioning.

The committee pointed out that over the past year, examinations such as UGC-NET, CSIR-NET and NEET-PG had to be postponed, while NEET-UG faced allegations of paper leaks and CUET (UG/PG) results were delayed. It also noted that during JEE Main 2025, at least 12 questions were withdrawn after errors were identified in the final answer key.

“The Committee reiterates that the NTA’s performance in the last year has not inspired much confidence … The Committee observed that such instances does not inspire confidence of the examinees in the system. The Committee therefore recommends that NTA needs to quickly get their act together so that such instances, which otherwise are fully avoidable, do not occur in future,” the report said. 

In its report, submitted in November last year, the panel said that some firms involved in paper-setting, administration, and correction have been blacklisted by either an organisation or state government, and yet, that did not impede their securing of contracts from other states or organisations. “The Committee is of the view that such blacklisted firms must not be engaged for any entrance test by the NTA or the State Governments,” it said. 

The panel looked at the NTA’s finances and said it collected around Rs 3,512.98 crore while it has spent Rs 3,064.77 crore, leaving a surplus of Rs 448 Crores in the last six years. The panel recommended that this surplus be used to build the agency’s capabilities to conduct tests itself, or to strengthen regulatory and monitoring capabilities for its vendors.