Issues affecting the conduct of NEET will persist unless individuals are held accountable, the Supreme Court said on Friday while seeking a comprehensive plan from the Ministry of Human Resource Development to overhaul the National Testing Agency (NTA).

A Bench of Justices PS Narasimha and Alok Aradhe said the situation was sensitive and that the accountability must be fixed to prevent a recurrence of issues regularly affecting the national-level examinations.

The Court said when something goes wrong with the examinations, it is not known who is responsible for a particular task.

"The real problem won’t stop till actual accountability arises. Not in terms of so and so will be liable, it will be effective when we know which individual shoulders the responsibility lies. Unless you identify the duty holders it will be a diffused obligation," the Bench said.

The observation comes days after the recent paper leak and cancellation of undergraduate National Eligibility cum Entrance Test 2026 (NEET UG 2026).

While calling the incident traumatic, the Court said the country must not disappoint the students and their families.

"It is very traumatic if this is happening. We cannot disappoint our students. It is not merely the student, it’s the family too… It is so much of emotions, love, time, years of study. It is not beyond us," the Bench remarked.

Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta agreed that the buck must stop somewhere. He informed the Court that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was personally supervising the situation.

"The Hon’ble Prime Minister is personally supervising this," he said.

The government is concerned about youth, Mehta added.

The Court observed that the problem with most of India's institutions was ad-hocism.

"The knowledge doesn’t percolate. It is not the individual who has the capability. It is the institution," the Bench said.

Accordingly, the Court directed that instead of the Union Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Human Resource Development shall file an affidavit before it on how to conduct the annual examinations and to improve the human resource by adding domain experts to NTA.

"The endeavor is to ensure that NTA would have the wherewithal, physical and intellectual, to ensure that no incident such as 2024/2026 examination occur," the Bench said as it listed the case for consideration in July.

The Court was hearing a batch of petitions filed after the recent leak of question papers of NEET UG 2026, the pre-medical entrance for candidates seeking admission to government and private medical colleges in India.

The petitions were filed after the Union government and the NTA cancelled NEET-UG 2026 held on May 3. The government has since ordered a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the allegations.

One of the petitions before the top court was filed by the Federation of All India Medical Association (FAIMA) through advocate Tanvi Dubey, seeking replacement or restructuring of the NTA. It has asked the Supreme Court to order re-conduct of NEET UG 2026 under the supervision of a judicially appointed committee headed by a retired Supreme Court judge.

The plea has also sought reforms including “digital locking” of question papers, transition to a Computer-Based Test (CBT) model and publication of centre-wise results to detect anomalies.

Another petition was filed by the United Doctors Front through advocates Ritu Reniwal and Charu Mathur, attacking the legal structure of the NTA itself and seeks its dissolution in the present form.

A separate plea filed by Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP Sudhakar Singh, social activist Anubhav Garg, Indian Medical Association national spokesperson Dhruv Chauhan and political leader Harisharan Devgan was also heard.

Their petition has sought immediate transition of NEET-UG to a Computer-Based Test (CBT) format, including for the re-examination scheduled on June 21, 2026.

NEET was plagued by similar allegations in 2024 as well. However, the NTA had not ordered re-examination that year on the ground that the leak of question paper was limited to Hazaribagh and Patna.

Even then, petitions were filed before the top court over the issue.

The Supreme Court then had accepted the NTA stand and declined to order a re-examination. Nevertheless, it had issued directions to strengthen the NEET exam framework.

It had said that the NTA should avoid "flip flops" with respect to safety of strongrooms where question papers are kept, grant of compensatory marks etc.

It had also directed a seven-member committee formed by the Central government to examine the issues and address the same.

Following a hearing of the present batch of petitions, the Court on May 25 had directed the NTA to file an affidavit regarding the monitoring committee.

It had also directed K Radhakrishnan, chairman of the committee, to file an affidavit about the steps taken to ensure compliance with the committee's directions.

Today, the Court asked Radhakrishnan about the progress made since constitution of the high-powered committee (HPC).

"Despite your monitoring on the basis of HPC recommendation, if this incident has happened, then there would be a problem with the recommendation. Or the monitoring may not have happened," the Bench remarked.

Radhakrishnan responded that 60 suggestions had been made and most of them were implemented.

"A few are still in the process. In 2025 NEET UG was conducted satisfactorily. There were incidents of power failures in some centres, otherwise the recommendations were implemented and it worked," he added.

Radhakrishnan further said that now there was involvement of all State governments and district administrations for secure examinations.

However, the Court questioned whether there was something not in contemplation of the HPC that lead to the latest paper leak.

Radhakrishnan said,

"Certain practices are under implementation. At the moment these are being taken care of for the re-examination on May 21."

The Court remarked that its endeavor is to ensure reforms are implemented.

"You need to learn from other institutions," the Bench said.

The Court also called for having a full-time expert body within the NTA. SG Mehta said certain measures were under consideration.

"Some new mechanisms are put in place for 21st examinations. It may not be appropriate to divulge what’s there. Otherwise it may defeat the purpose," Mehta said.

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