Mumbai, August 16: The National Testing Agency (NTA) has announced the cancellation of the UGC-NET exams for English, Commerce, and Sociology subjects due to significant spelling and printing errors in the question papers. The exams were initially conducted from June 22 to June 30.
In a statement released on Sunday, the NTA acknowledged that several questions had been repeated from previous exams, and students raised concerns about these discrepancies after the provisional answer keys were released. The agency stated that simply removing questions would not rectify the issues present in the papers.
New dates for the re-examinations have been set for September 9 and 10. The English exam will take place on September 9 from 9 AM to 12 PM, followed by the Commerce paper on the same day from 3 PM to 6 PM. The Sociology exam is scheduled for September 10 from 9 AM to 12 PM. Importantly, no additional fees will be charged to students for retaking these exams.
The NTA formed a committee to investigate the complaints received, which revealed various factual, typing, and translation errors in the papers. These included incorrect names, misspelled book titles, poorly phrased questions, and grammatical mistakes. The committee also found that a significant number of previously asked questions were repeated in the recent exams.
Earlier on Sunday, the NTA had released provisional answer keys for 84 out of 87 subjects, with the three subjects in question not having their answer keys published.
The NTA has faced ongoing controversies, including a paper leak incident during the NEET-UG exam held on May 3 of this year, which led to a re-examination on June 21. Similar issues were reported in the NEET exam in 2024.