NEW DELHI: In a move to ensure that students complete their NEET-UG re-exam held on June 21 on time, the National Testing Agency (NTA) had procured 95,000 clocks so that each exam hall was equipped with one.
As watches, both digital and analog, are banned in exam halls under NTA guidelines, the move has benefited students in better time management. More than 20 lakh students appeared for the medical entrance re-exam at 5,440 centres in India and abroad. Officials said the agency will continue to provide clocks for future NEET-UG exams.
“Following the exam which was cancelled on May 3, we conducted a survey among students on the facilities they would require to perform better in the exams.
The need for the time to be displayed continuously during the duration of the test was repeatedly requested by the students,” NTA Director General Abhishek Singh told this newspaper.
Some exam centres did have clocks but a majority did not have them. “To ensure a level-playing field, the NTA decided to purchase clocks for all the 95,000 exam halls in our centres.
We took the decision by May end and had just three weeks to do so,” the NTA Director General said. “Since the big players in the industry requested more time to provide 95,000 clocks, the order was placed with multiple smaller players to make the procurement faster,” he said.
As a gesture of goodwill, the NTA has decided to permit the schools to retain the clocks with themselves so that it benefits students of the institutions. “In any case, many of them will be our future NEET-UG candidates,” Singh said. The gesture was appreciated by students at multiple centres according to the feedback received, the Director General added.
Way back in August 2021, an advocate, Garima Singh, had made a strong pitch for placing clocks inside exam centres as time management was of crucial importance for students.
The NEET-UG retest was conducted amid heightened security measures, over a month after the examination was cancelled following allegations of a paper leak.
While the NTA described the exercise as glitch-free, many candidates said the question paper was tougher than the cancelled examination. The NTA Director General assured that the results of the re-examination will be released as soon as possible.