Opposition Congress MP and Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, Digvijaya Singh, has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, seeking a white paper on paper leaks and exam irregularities in exams conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) over the last eight years. This would inspire renewed confidence in the administration’s ability and willingness to deliver justice to Indian students, he said.
Singh said the lack of a unified public record on paper leaks and action taken was a major concern among students after the National Eligibility Test with Undergraduate Entrance Test (NEET-UG 2026) was canceled last month. He blamed the information vacuum for rumors and speculation about him.
The NTA canceled the NEET-UG 2026 exam on May 12, nine days after 2.27 million students took the exam in 551 cities. The move came after central agencies confirmed that the question paper had been hacked. Questions were available on some people’s phones as early as May 1, two days before the exam. This was the second time in two years that the NEET-UG had fallen into mystery, prompting the NTA to hand over the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and schedule the re-examination on June 21.
Singh said the white paper should include the actions taken by the NTA and investigating agencies in each case, the names and status of those detained, the progress of investigations, whether chargesheets or closure reports have been filed, and the reasons for filing any closure reports.
He said it should also be made clear whether the accused are facing trial, out on bail, convicted, etc. Singh called for strengthening confidence in the system when tens of thousands of students are under severe pressure. “Such transparency will serve as a confidence building measure among our youth,” Singh wrote in a letter dated June 4 (Thursday).
Singh said students had contacted him in recent weeks, expressing concerns about the lack of clarity surrounding investigations into exam irregularities and paper leakage cases.
The NTA was established in May 2018 as an independent “primary testing organisation”. She spent much of her existence fighting fires.
HT reported on May 13 how the NTA’s problems predated the current crisis. Between 2018 and 2023, the NTA has been plagued by technical glitches, linguistic errors in question papers, dropped questions in final answer keys, and examination center allocation issues. Since 2024, the problems have become more serious.
Inconsistencies, irregularities and alleged malpractices marred NEET-UG 2024. This was followed by the leak-related cancellation and reconduct of UGC-NET in June, August and September 2024, the first complete re-examination of the NTA after an integrity breach, indicating a profound institutional failure.
A parliamentary committee on education found (December 2025) that at least five out of 14 competitive examinations conducted by the NTA in 2024 and early 2025 had “significant problems”. UGC-NET, CSIR-NET and NEET-PG had to be postponed (although they were not conducted by NTA). In January 2025, at least 12 questions in JEE Main had to be withdrawn after errors were found in the final answer key.
Singh referred to the past controversies and said students have repeatedly expressed concerns that Sanjeev Kumar, also known as Mukhiya, an accused in the 2024 NEET-UG paper leak case in Jharkhand’s Hazaribagh, has been out on bail. He cited reports that the CBI had submitted a closure report in the 2024 UGC-NET case. Singh noted that the agency had sought additional time when the Delhi court asked it to submit a written explanation of its findings.
