Supreme Court dismisses plea seeking postponement of NEET-PG

The Supreme Court on Friday rejected a plea seeking postponement of the NEET-PG examination, scheduled for 11 August, which claimed that candidates have been allocated cities that are highly inconvenient for them to reach.

A bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud, justices J.B. Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said it can't put the careers of two lakh students in jeopardy for five students.

"How can we postpone such an exam. Mr Sanjay Hegde, nowadays people just come asking to postpone the exam. It's not a perfect world. We are not academic experts.

"As a matter of principle, we will not reschedule the exam. There are two lakh students and four lakh parents who will weep over the weekend if we postpone it. We cannot put the careers of so many candidates in jeopardy. We do not know who is behind these petitions," the bench said.

Senior advocate Sanjay Hegde, appearing for the petitioners, submitted that rescheduling the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Postgraduate) (NEET-PG) is needed because there is one exam in the morning and one in the afternoon.

The plea said many candidates have been allocated cities which are highly inconvenient for them to reach. It said the test cities were allotted on 31 July and the specific centres will be declared on 8 August.

The exam was initially to be held on 23 June. It was postponed by the Union Health Ministry as a "precautionary measure" in the wake of alleged irregularities in certain other competitive exams.