NEET 2026 Re-Examination on June 21, Minister Pradhan Says Exam to be Computer-Based from Next Year
The Wire Staff
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New Delhi: The National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (Undergraduate) [NEET (UG)] 2026 re-examination for medical admissions is scheduled to be held on June 21 (Sunday), the National Testing Agency (NTA) announced today (Friday). Further, Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that the exam will be computer-based from next year while asserting that OMR ( (Optical Mark Recognition) sheets are the root cause of the paper leak.
The June-21 re-exam will be from 2 pm to 5.15 pm, fifteen minutes longer than usual. The fee has been waived completely. Students will get a one-week window to choose their exam city, and admit cards will be issued by June 14.
"NEET will transition to computer-based test mode from next year. OMR sheets are the root cause of the paper leak," Pradhan said in a press conference today.
Over 22 lakh candidates had appeared for the NEET 2026 exam which was held on May 3 across 5,432 centres nationwide and was later canceled on Tuesday (May 12) due to alleged irregularities related to the paper leak.
IMA expresses concern and anguish
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) expressed deep concern and anguish over the "recurring irregularities" and "alleged paper leaks affecting national competitive examinations, particularly NEET-UG".
"These developments have shaken the confidence of lakhs of hardworking students and their families, who dedicate years of sacrifice, discipline, and hope toward securing admission into medical colleges," IMA president Dr Anilkumar J. Nayak wrote in a letter addressed to Union minister Pradhan.
The medical body underlined that the examination conducted by NTA has faced repeated controversies in recent years and suggested nine reform measures to prevent irregularities in the future including shifting to online exams, decentralising the process to give states and Union Territories more responsibility, and introducing advanced security and technological safeguards. The IMA also proposed a time-bound Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) investigation, fast-track courts, immediate and exemplary punishment for those involved, independent oversight and accountability, and counselling support for affected students.
'Recurring, systemic, and catastrophic'
The Federation of Indian Medical Association (FAIMA) has approached the Supreme Court, calling the NTA's failures "recurring, systemic, and catastrophic" and urged the court to take a "stricter approach," The Hindu reported.
In its petition, FAIMA said the NTA had "casually" ignored the recommendations of the Radhakrishnan Committee – set up after the 2024 leak – and the Supreme Court's own directions. It called for a "mechanism in place to ensure that any non-compliances will lead to exemplary penalties."
The petition laid out a trail of lapses the Supreme Court had itself flagged in 2024 – unauthorised access to strongrooms, question papers being transported on e-rickshaws and through private couriers, no prescribed time limit for OMR sheet submission, and zero direct oversight over invigilators, as per TH report.
In Hazaribagh, the rear door of a strongroom was prised open and outsiders were let in before the exam. "Despite these lapses being explicitly pointed out by SC, the NTA has failed to implement meaningful corrective action," FAIMA said.
The federation also took aim at what it called the NTA's over-reliance on private vendors for logistics, security and centre management – funnelling public funds into the "lowest bidder" infrastructure despite repeated warnings from Parliamentary Standing Committees and the Supreme Court.
"NTA continues to rely on risky, old-fashioned methods like physically printing question papers and using private couriers for transport making it prone to leak," the petition said.
Further, FAIMA referred to the government's tech upgrades – GPS tracking and 5G jammers – as "useless and cosmetic".
Conducting NEET-UG 2026 again using the same methods and the same contractors, without first putting the Radhakrishnan Committee's safeguards in place, is "highly irresponsible," FAIMA said. "It practically guarantees that another paper leak will happen, causing further trauma to the students."
FAIMA has underlined that the leaks warrant that the Supreme Court can invoke Article 142, which gives the apex court the power to pass any order it deems necessary to deliver complete justice in a case before it, enforceable across the entire country. It also urged the court to order the creation of a "modern, foolproof, and transparent system so that the futures of millions of students are never put at risk again."
The petition also flagged that the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024, which allows up to ten years in prison for organised paper leak rackets, has done little to prevent leaks because it is "purely punitive in nature," kicking in only after the damage is done, with no independent body to proactively watch over the process.
"State cannot repeatedly betray this expectation, cancel examinations post-facto, order CBI probes, and return to the same defective system for the next cycle. Such a pattern of conduct is not merely negligent it is a constitutional failure," the petition said, as per the report.
The alleged paper leak case is being investigated by the CBI. The agency has reportedly arrested seven suspected accused – Mangilal Biwal, Vikas Biwal and Dinesh Biwal from Jaipur, Rajasthan; Yash Yadav from Gurugram, Haryana; and Shubham Khairnar from Nashik and Dhananjay Lokhande from Ahilyanagar and beauty salon owner Manisha Waghmare from Pune in Maharashtra – and conducted raids on multiple locations.
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