Addressing the concerns of students and parents, the National Testing Agency (NTA) late on Thursday evening said that there was complete “transparency” in the conduct of the exam and “revision of a wrong answer key as well as grace marks to compensate students for lost time at some centres” led to a high number of toppers in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG) 2024, results to which were announced two days ago.
NEET is conducted every year for admission to undergraduate medical courses.
Students and parents raised concerns about at least 67 candidates getting All India Rank (AIR) One, with six of them being from one centre in Haryana. Of these, 44 candidates were announced toppers. This was the first time ever that the number of those bagging the first rank was huge, as compared to a few every year.
The NTA has attributed the higher number of toppers to the revision of a wrong answer key and compensation of marks to those who lost time at a few exam centres.
Compensation of marks
The NTA, which conducts the exam across India, clarified that this was on account of “grace marks” being allotted to students to “compensate” them for the time they lost at the examination centre.
According to a senior NTA official, the loss of examination time was ascertained and such candidates were compensated with marks based on their answering efficiency and time lost, as per the mechanism/ formula established by the apex Court in its 2018 judgement.
“A total of 1563 candidates were compensated for the loss of time and the revised marks of such candidates vary from -20 to 720 marks. Amongst these, the score of two candidates also happens to be 718 and 719 marks respectively due to compensatory marks,” the official said.
This happened after a few writ petitions were filed by the candidates of NEET (UG) 2024 before the high courts of Punjab and Haryana, Delhi, and Chhattisgarh, raising concerns of loss of exam time during the conduct of the test on May 5 at a few centres.
“The concerns raised by the candidates, through the Writ Petitions and representations submitted to NTA required careful consideration for redressal. Therefore, a Grievance Redressal Committee consisting of eminent experts from the field of examination and academia, was constituted to look into such grievances/representations and to submit its recommendations. The Committee considered the representations on the basis of factual reports of the functionaries and CCTV footages from concerned exam centres,” the NTA said in a statement.
It added that on the analysis of the CCTV footage, it was ascertained that the “integrity of the examination was not compromised at these centres”.
High no. of toppers
The NTA also clarified its stance on the unprecedented number of toppers in the NEET- UG 2024 exam.
This year the number of candidates appearing for the exam increased to 23,33,297 from 20,38,596 in 2023.
“The increase in candidates naturally led to an increase in high scorers due to a larger pool of candidates,” Sadhna Parashar, senior director of NTA, said in a statement.
Senior officials in the NTA clarified that it received 13,373 challenges to the provisional answer key of one question in Physics. Due to the differences in the old and new editions of the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) textbook (which is the main study material), the subject experts held that two options be taken as correct in place of one option for this question.
“Out of the 67 candidates who got 720/720 marks, 44 are on account of the revision in one Answer Key of Physics and 06 are on account of compensatory marks for loss of time,” said Parashar.
She added that it is pertinent to mention that the toppers are from across the country.
The NTA said that the cutoff scores are determined based on the “overall performance” of candidates each year. “The increase in cutoff reflects the competitive nature of the examination and the higher performance standards achieved by the candidates this year,” it said.
Cut-offs and average marks of qualified candidates (out of 720) vary each year.
The exam was conducted on May 5, 2024, for over 24 lakh candidates across 571 cities (including 14 cities abroad).
Stay ahead with all the exam results updates on News18 Website.
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