Why India’s Testing Agency Is Losing Students’ Trust

For millions of Indian students, the National Testing Agency (NTA) was supposed to be a solution. Established in 2017, the body was supposed to bring in transparency, efficiency, and standardization to important entrance examinations. However, the acronym stands for nothing less than puzzlement, anxiety, and turmoil in the minds of the aspirants today.

The National Testing Agency's (NTA) has been repeatedly plagued with technical issues, has been releasing results late, and some students have even found errors in their question papers. The agency's credibility issues are piling up day by day. Students and scholars are now doubting if the agency is really awarding merit or just giving marks to those who have survived the disorder and have rote learned.

“It Doesn’t Test Research Ability”

Many students along with academics vigorously claim that examinations brought forward by the NTA are not measuring the attributes that they are supposed to. Chandni Yadav, who did UGC NET and is currently doing first year PhD in History at BHU, has expressed her biggest doubt in the very purpose of such examination. She feels that the test is checking for memorization ability rather than the research aptitude.

Her statement resonates with the general sentiment in the academic community that the focus of exams UGC NET and JRF is that a student remembers and regurgitates facts instead of undergoing analytical thinking, building a line of argument, and methodological understanding skills which are indispensable for carrying out serious research.

Considering the scenario, if a system is meant to select the future scholars, then it was a rather counterproductive move to spotlight rote learning.

A Pattern of Errors

Beyond academic concerns, the agency’s recurring “technical errors” have a human cost. Server crashes, wrong answer keys, mismatched question papers, and inconsistent marking schemes have repeatedly disrupted students’ futures. In some cases, candidates have even been forced to resort to filing court petitions or starting social media campaigns for their grievances to be resolved. More often than not, these examinations serve as the only vehicle of social advancement for students who come from rural pockets, economically weaker sections, or are first generation learners. If such a way is made uncertain, then the harm caused is not only at the level of education but also at the level of the mind, money, and every person.

An Exam System That Encourages Coaching, Not Curiosity

Critics also argue that the NTA’s model encourages coaching-driven performance rather than intellectual curiosity. Rather than encouraging conceptual clarity, the system is designed to reward pattern, cracking and speed, based strategies, thus making costly coaching centres more powerful than schools. This destroys the very notion of equal opportunity. While India is discussing the future of its education system, the scandal of the NTA prompts a bigger question: Are entrance exams designed to list students in order of merit or to really assess their potential?

If the agency goes on to emphasize scale at the expense of sensitivity and automation at the expense of accountability, it will run the risk of turning education into a mere mechanical filtering process rather than a sincere assessment of capability.