Candidates wait for biometric attendance at a NEET exam centre in Tamil Nadu. File
| Photo Credit: The Hindu
The Delhi High Court has ordered the National Testing Agency (NTA) to streamline the biometric verification processes for the conduct of National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) in future.
A bench of Chief Justice D.K. Upadhyaya and Justice Sachin Dutta noted that it would be “apposite for the NTA to constitute a Grievance Redressal Framework to examine the complaints or grievances of candidates in a time-bound manner.”
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The court’s direction came while setting aside an order of a single judge Bench that awarded ‘grace marks’ to two candidates of NEET (UG) 2025 by applying ‘normalization formula’ and other consequential directions. NTA had filed an appeal against the July 28 order.
The candidates had alleged that time was lost during the course of conduct of NEET (UG) 2025, which was attributable to acts of omission and commission by the personnel deployed at the examination venue.
The candidates said that on the day of the exam on May 4, 2025, although they had reached the examination centre within the stipulated time, “disturbances and loss of time took place at the centre due to the failure of biometric verification, as a result of which there was a delay in authentication”.
They said the entire process resulted in the candidates entering and being seated in the examination hall just in the nick of time. During the course of the examination, the candidates were interrupted to undergo Aadhaar verification once again and resubmit the undertaking, as a result of which crucial time was lost.
NTA, in its appeal against the single judge Bench order, argued that the candidates did not strictly adhere to the reporting time referred to in the admit cards issued to them and arrived at the examination venue shortly before the prescribed outer deadline for last entry.
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The court, in the August 6 order, highlighted, “the chaotic consequences of extending ‘marks improvisation’ for individual delays in biometric authentication for reasons not attributable to the testing agency”.
“Such an approach would open the floodgates to claims by candidates who experienced even minor technical delays in biometric authentication… Granting marks for delays in the process of biometric verification, that too for no fault of the appellant, would not be a justifiable course to follow,” it added.
Published – August 07, 2025 08:56 pm IST
