Supreme Court Defers Hearing In NEET PG Case Due To Waqf Board Matter Hearing

The SC deferred the NEET PG 2025 hearing to May 23 due to another case. The United Doctors' Front challenges the two-shift exam format, citing concerns over transparency and normalisation processes.

NEET-PG exam is under fire because of the two-session conduct and the normalisation process.

Source : ABPLIVE AI

NEET PG Case: The Supreme Court deferred the NEET PG 2025 hearing to May 23 due to the ongoing arguments in the Waqf case, presented by advocate Kapil Sibal. The petition by United Doctors' Front challenged the exam being held in two shifts, seeking a single-session format.

The case has already seen multiple deferrals. Initially slated for September 2024, the hearing centres around issues raised by a group of 19 medical aspirants, including concerns over transparency, last-minute changes in the exam pattern, and the normalisation process used in scoring.

The controversy surrounding the upcoming NEET PG 2025 exam reached the Supreme Court, with doctors across India voicing serious concerns over its proposed format.

The United Doctors' Front (UDF) filed a petition, urging the Apex Court to mandate that the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test for Postgraduates (NEET PG) be conducted in a single shift nationwide.

The plea, filed under Article 32 of the Constitution, challenges the National Board of Examinations’ (NBE) decision to hold the high-stakes medical entrance exam in two separate shifts using different question papers. The petition slammed the move as "arbitrary" and "non-transparent", arguing that the normalisation process used to equalize scores between shifts lacks clarity and undermines merit-based assessment.

The NEET PG case had earlier been postponed to May 20. It was heard last week by a bench of Chief Justice BR Gavai and Justice AG Masih, who said the petitions largely pertained to the NEET PG 2024 exam cycle that had already concluded. The petitioners' counsel, however, argued that the grievances extend beyond a single year, pointing to systemic issues such as the methodology used for calculating scores, discrepancies in the answer keys, and inconsistencies in mark distribution.

Why The Normalisation Process Is Under Fire

At the heart of the controversy lies the normalisation process, a statistical method used to adjust scores when exams are conducted on multiple days with different sets of questions. While designed to level the playing field, critics argue that the current formula lacks transparency and may unfairly penalise or benefit candidates based on the relative difficulty of the paper they faced.