CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Tuesday sought the National Testing Agency (NTA) to submit the CCTV footage from the four NEET-UG examination centres that suffered power outage due to sudden storm, rains and gusty winds on May 4 when the examination was underway.
A division bench comprising justices J Nisha Banu and M Jothiraman issued the direction while hearing an appeal filed by 13 of the affected students challenging the orders of a single judge who dismissed the petitions seeking reconduct of the examination. However, the bench did not grant interim stay on the order.
The petitioners stated that the single judge had failed to appreciate there was genuine and significant disruption at the centres due to the power outage and erred in relying solely on the self-serving internal reports of the NTA without independently examining the objective proof such as CCTV footage or affidavits from the candidates.
The single judge also failed to consider that even a minor disparity in exam conditions, especially in a highly competitive, national-level entrance exam like NEET, severely compromises equal opportunity, they said in the petition.
Additional Solicitor General (ASG) ARL Sundaresan, appearing for NTA, submitted that 22 lakh students have written the exam and are waiting for the results and at the very centre, where the appellants wrote the exam, there were 470 students and only 12 have come to court. If a stay is granted, it will affect the other students who have no grievance, he told the bench.
It may be noted that 16 of the candidates who took the exam on May 4 at PM SHRI KV schools at Avadi and Meenambakkam, Govt Higher Secondary School, Kundrathur, and Padma Seshadri School in KK Nagar had filed the writ petitions seeking re-examination.
