NEET-UG paper leak: Who, how many bought question papers for Rs 15 lakh?

Arrests made in Sikar (Rajasthan), Nashik (Maharashtra) and Dehradun (Uttarakhand) indicate that question papers were on sale weeks before the national entrance test for admission in undergraduate courses in medical colleges. A set of 400 to 600 questions were being offered for Rs 10 lakhs to Rs 15 lakhs to aspirants across the country.

According to the police, as many as 120 questions from the set figured in the 180 questions framed. The fact that the sets were being sold at such high prices establish that the buyers were aware that the questions would be asked at the test.

The reason why 400 to 600 questions formed each set, it is speculated, is to provide the sellers and the buyers the alibi that they were buying ‘guess papers’ and it was a coincidence that 120 questions from the set were asked at the test.

“What we know is that 140 of the 180 questions in NEET were part of a guess paper of 410 questions. What is alarming is that the order of the questions and the options were exactly the same. The modus operandi is simple. In Sikar, the students are called in for a mock test, a day before the actual exam and made to prepare for each of the questions in the guess paper.

The students had 140 of the 180 questions prepared, which guaranteed them 600 of the 720 marks even before they entered the exam hall,” tweeted Maheshwar Peri, founder of career counselling firm Careers 360.

Vishal Bansal, Additional Director General of Police, SOG, Rajasthan had stated that the ‘guess paper’ had over 400 questions of which around 120 appeared in the actual examination.

“…this guess paper was with students’ weeks before the examination, as far back as a month,” he said, adding that the inquiry so far hasn’t revealed where the question paper originated from and that it was found on WhatsApp – in the mobile phones of students appearing for this examination, “It is a .pdf file of about 150 pages with over 400 questions,” he added.

The examination was conducted across the country at over 5,432 centres, in 551 cities in India and 14 cities abroad. Approximately 22.79 lakh registered students are believed to have appeared at the examination. Physically transporting question papers to all these centres would have taken several weeks and involved hundreds of agencies and handlers—making it difficult to track down leaks.

All that the National Testing Agency (NTA) has stated so far is that they were tipped off about the leak on 7 May, four days after the examination; that the NTA referred the case to the police the next day. Once confirmation was received about the leak, the NTA decided to cancel the examination and hold the examination again.

“NEET is a pen & paper examination. The physical paper is transported to over 5000 centres and involve at least 200,000 hands,” pointed out Peri. With question papers being transported for weeks before the examination, their vulnerability is high, he said on TV.

“It is common sense that in the conduct of such an examination over a large geographical area, the question paper has a very high probability of being leaked and such leaks have happened in the past too; the answer is not attempts to 'plug' the leaks but the answer is to abolish NEET,” fumed former union minister P. Chidambaram.

What also makes leakage of question papers inevitable is the huge difference between the cost of medical admission in government medical colleges, where the fee hovers around five lakh Rupees, and private medical colleges where a seat may cost up to Rs 1.5 crore. It makes sense for parents to shell out Rs 15 lakhs for question papers in advance of the test, if that helps secure a seat in a government medical college.

Former Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has alleged that Rajasthan government tried to cover up the case for two weeks. “The BJP government in Rajasthan deliberately tried to cover it up for two weeks and played with the future of the youth.

The BJP government in Rajasthan had previously concealed the OMR sheet scam in the Employee Selection Board (recruitment exam) to avoid tarnishing the government’s image. Due to weak prosecution, the accused in that case were even granted bail. Similarly, an attempt was made to hide information about the NEET (UG) exam leak, he alleged.

Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal also weighed in and wondered why leaks of question papers are being reported from primarily BJP-ruled states, pointing out the national level entrance exams cancelled since 2014.