3 min readNew DelhiMay 22, 2026 04:40 AM IST
Senior officials of the National Testing Agency (NTA) were learnt to have told a parliamentary panel on Thursday that the NEET-UG examination was cancelled because the situation had reached a point where the credibility of the examination was impacted.
The remarks by the NTA officials were made at a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, which is headed by Congress MP Digvijaya Singh.
The panel had summoned top officials of the Education Ministry and NTA officials, including its Director General (DG) Abhishek Singh and Chairperson Pradeep Kumar Joshi.
The Committee members from the Opposition parties are learnt to have raised questions regarding the alleged intelligence failure and that it should be viewed seriously. During the meeting, demands were raised from Opposition members for senior NTA officials to take moral responsibility for the alleged leak.
The Opposition leaders and the NTA officials are learnt to have differed on calling the incident a paper leak, with BJP members suggesting that it should be said that the examination was compromised and not that there was a leak.
The committee also directed the NTA to submit more detailed explanations on the alleged leak. The officials are learnt to have told the panel that steps were being taken to conduct the re-examination in a flawless manner.
During the meeting, demands were raised that senior officials should take moral responsibility. Officials from the Education Ministry informed the committee that the incident was unfortunate.
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There were also objections from the panel members during the meeting regarding Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s comments at a press conference recently that the House committee had members from Opposition parties and that their remarks were written in a “certain way”.
Committee members, including Dean Kuriakose, objected to the minister’s statement that the committee was “playing politics”.
Last week, while addressing a press conference, Pradhan was asked about the issues that the Parliamentary Standing Committee had flagged in its report last year. Pradhan had said: “I will not go by the opinion of the parliamentary committee. I will go by the recommendation of the Radhakrishnan committee…I will proceed based on facts; we won’t talk about assumptions. In political tones…I will respond in Parliament… The parliamentary standing committee has Opposition members. They write in a certain way, you also know that.”
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