Supreme Court Rejects Plea to Postpone NEET-PG Exam Scheduled for Sunday

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a petition seeking the postponement of the NEET-PG examination scheduled for Sunday, despite concerns raised about exam centre allocations and the normalisation of marks for two batches.

A bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud stated, “We cannot devise a new education policy, and this is not a perfect world.” The petitioners argued that differences in the difficulty levels of question papers for the two batches could disadvantage some candidates, and demanded the disclosure of the normalisation formula before the exams.

The petitioners also highlighted that many candidates were assigned exam centres in highly inconvenient locations, with the exact centres being disclosed just two days before the exam.

The bench, which included Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, noted that “two lakh students and four lakh parents will suffer” if the exam is postponed, questioning whether the careers of so many should be jeopardised “at the behest of five petitioners.” The Chief Justice added, “We cannot put the careers of so many candidates at risk just because of these petitioners.”

Senior advocate Sanjay Hegde, representing the petitioners, argued that it would be challenging for candidates to sit for exams scheduled for both the morning and afternoon sessions. However, the court was firm in its decision, stating, “We are not entertaining the plea.”

The NEET-PG exam, originally set for June 23, had been postponed earlier by the Union Health Ministry as a precautionary measure due to alleged irregularities in other competitive exams.