Why were 1,563 NEET-UG candidates given grace marks? Why are they being scrapped now?

The NEET exam results are turning into a huge mess. The Centre has announced to the Supreme that it has decided to cancel the grace marks awarded to 1,563 candidates who appeared for NEET UG 2024, and that these students will be given an option to take a re-test on 23 June. The results for the same will be announced on 30 June and counselling for admission in the MBBS, BDS, other courses will start on 6 July, the Centre said.

The court, after hearing the Centre’s decision, said that a re-exam will be conducted for the 1,563 students. A vacation bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta said: “A subsequent Committee has made recommendations after deliberations which are placed before us. According to recommendation, scorecards of 1563 candidates will be cancelled and stand withdrawn. A re-exam will be conducted for these 1563 candidates. The results of those who don’t wish to appear will be based on their actual marks without compensatory marks.

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“For those who appear for re-test, the 5 May scores will be discarded,” the court added.

But why were these grace marks awarded? And how was it decided upon to give these to the NEET aspirants? We take a closer look and explain the situation.

NEET results raise eyebrows

The National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate) (NEET-UG) is the sole entrance exam for admission to undergraduate medical programmes in all medical institutions in the country, held annually.

This year, over 24 lakh students appeared for the exam on 5 May at 4,750 centres across 571 cities, including 14 cities abroad.

The results were to be declared on 14 June but were announced on 4 June, apparently because the answer sheets were evaluated earlier. The results drew immediate attention for the large number of students who got the perfect score of 720/720. In fact, this year around, as many as 67 students scored a perfect 720 — scores that some claim are almost impossible to get in the scheme of the exam. Compare it to last year where only two students managed to secure full marks and in the year before it was three. In 2021, two achieved the feat and one in 2020.

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Some even raised questions over the 718 and 719 scores, arguing that these were mathematically impossible because in NEET’s marking scheme each question carries four marks and there is negative marking for wrong answers.

It was later found that of the 67 who topped the exam, 44 had been given “grace marks”. The National Testing Agency (NTA), responsible for conducting the exam, had last week said that a total of 1,563 candidates, including the 44, had been given grace marks, and the revised scores of these varied from -20 to 720.

Reason for awarding grace marks

But what exactly was the reason behind giving over 1,500 candidates grace marks?

Last week, the NTA stated that candidates had been awarded grace marks, though it didn’t mention how much, owing to “loss of time”.

Students from a few centres in Bahadurgarh (Haryana), Delhi, and Chhattisgarh, complained that they did not get the allotted time to complete their tests.

According to the NTA statement, a “Grievance Redressal Committee consisting of eminent experts from the field of examination and academia” looked into these grievances “on the basis of factual reports of the functionaries and CCTV footages from concerned exam Centres”.

Thereafter, “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 Hon’ble Apex Court, vide its judgment dated 13.06.2018”.

Another reason for awarding grace marks was one multiple-choice physics question in the paper. On 29 May, NTA released its provisional answer key which showed that Option 1 is correct. However, candidates challenged that, arguing that the old version of the Class 12 NCERT textbook gave another answer.

Following this, an NTA official said: “Since we strongly recommend all aspirants study only from NCERT textbooks for their NEET preparation, we decided to give credit to all those candidates who had marked the other option as stated by us in the answer key.”

Another NTA official told the Indian Express: “In India, for ages, older siblings have been passing on their books to their younger siblings, and there is no harm in it; we have all done it. The NTA cannot ask students to specially buy new books too as it may not be viable for everyone. So, we will hold a meeting and establish proper protocols for such a situation.”

Notably, the NTA hasn’t flagged this issue with NCERT. And when asked about it, said, “We will notify the NCERT now for future reference, but nothing can be done by NCERT for this year’s NEET exam.”

Normalisation process questioned

The decision to award these grace marks was based off a normalisation formula that emerged from a 2018 Supreme Court judgment on a similar incident in the Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) exam. The normalisation formula adopted in the CLAT 2018 exam adjusted the candidate’s score based on the time lost and the answering efficiency, reports Indian Express.

Students have also argued that scores are normalised for other entrance exams such as JEE Main and CUET where the exam ins held on different days. However, in NEET-UG, the exam is held on the same day across the nation. Moreover, this information wasn’t shared with the public beforehand.

Responding to this, the NTA has said that it will try to add this point in the future information bulletins of NEET UG too.

Anger prevails

Besides the grace marks issue, the NEET-UG exam has also been hit with claims of a paper leak and more, angering students across the nation.

It has also snowballed into a political row with the Congress demanding a Supreme Court-monitored probe into the NEET exam issue. As per a PTI report, the opposition party also sought the removal of the National Testing Agency (NTA) director general and claimed that the BJP government’s attitude towards the ongoing demand for an inquiry into the NEET examination is “irresponsible and insensitive”.

Meanwhile, Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan rejected allegations of a paper leak in the medical entrance exam, saying there is no evidence of it. “There is no evidence of paper leak in NEET-UG. The allegations of corruption in NTA are unfounded, it is a very credible body,” Pradhan told reporters. “The Supreme Court is hearing the matter and we will abide by its decision. We will ensure no student is at a disadvantage,” he added.

With inputs from agencies