National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test applicant accuses OMR tampering, to sue

One of the city's National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) applicants has accused the NTA (National Testing Agency) of tampering with the OMR sheet posted on its website under her name, and it did not reflect the answers she had written during the exam.

Student Spurthy S of Soundarya PU College expressed her views at a press conference. She reported that she saw a stark difference between answers she had provided and the ones in the OMR sheet given on the website.

In a letter addressed to NTA, she stated: "On trying to download my OMR sheet, I faced preliminary technical glitches. When it did become available, I noticed that shaded bubbles for the register number were accurate but the handwritten number looked overwritten. I also distinctly recall putting the time below my signature as advised by the invigilator while taking the exam. But the time written on the OMR sheet is not visible in the scanned version. It created doubts about potential technical misread or mismatch at the time of assessment."

"Numerous attempts I made and marked are not shaded. A few questions I failed to attempt are shaded. This has resulted in a difference of close to 174 marks, contrary to my performance and expectation," she complained.

She said that whereas now her rank stands at about 93,000, it would have been approximately 200, according to answers she said she had attempted and marked.

Although she wrote to NTA on June 3, the agency responded on June 12 informing her that the OMR sheet belonged to her. "We want to assure you that the OMR sheet shown on the portal is identical with the one sent by you to the exam centre. The sheet contains the information entered by you, your roll number (both in numbers and bubbled form), question paper booklet number and series code, and has your signature and the invigilator's signature on it. The image which you can see is a scanned version of the original OMR sheet obtained from the centre in accordance with due procedure. Responses which are being displayed have been entered by you while appearing for the exam. We hope you are satisfied now," the reply stated.

The student claimed she is going to approach Karnataka high court regarding the issue. "I have got 625 out of 625 marks in SSLC and 99% in II PU. I got rank 1,386 in CET," she added.