New Delhi: Fresh protests erupted in the national capital on Monday after the National Testing Agency (NTA) announced that UGC-NET examinations for three subjects would be conducted again. Student organisations opposing the decision called for greater accountability from the testing agency and, in some cases, demanded that the NTA be abolished altogether.
The protests follow growing criticism of the agency over repeated examination-related controversies. The latest dispute centres on the June 2026 UGC-NET examination, after an expert committee identified factual, typographical, translation and language-related problems in papers for English, Commerce and Sociology.
The All-India Students' Association (AISA) demonstrated outside the NTA headquarters at Okhla Industrial Estate, demanding that the agency be completely scrapped. The organisation described the decision to cancel and re-conduct the three papers as another indication of what it termed systemic mismanagement.
The Students' Federation of India (SFI) also organised a demonstration at the NTA office in Okhla and called for protests against the agency across the country.
Meanwhile, the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) raised concerns about the errors in a national-level examination and questioned the credibility of the examination process.
ABVP National General Secretary Virendra Singh Solanki said candidates should not bear the consequences of mistakes made during the examination process.
"Serious errors in a national-level examination like UGC-NET are deeply concerning. Students should not have to pay the price for NTA's lapses," Solanki said.
The organisation said it had previously flagged concerns about delays in the release of the provisional answer key. It also called for stronger quality-control mechanisms covering expert review, translation, proofreading and final checks before question papers are issued.
AISA alleged that police detained protesters who had gathered outside the NTA headquarters. The organisation criticised the alleged action and linked it to what it described as earlier instances of repression during student protests over examination-related issues.
"We strongly condemn the brutal detention of protesting students," AISA said, alleging that the police's action was a continuation of the repression witnessed during earlier student movements over examination irregularities.
There was no immediate response from the police to the allegations.
AISA further claimed that concerns had emerged regarding the Sociology paper, including the alleged circulation of a PDF containing questions and answers purportedly originating from within the NTA system. It also alleged that several questions in the English paper had been repeated from the 2024 examination.
The NTA released the UGC-NET answer key on August 16, almost two months after the examination. Alongside the answer key, the agency issued a special notice regarding the English, Commerce and Sociology papers.
Later that day, the NTA announced that candidates who appeared for the three papers would have to take fresh examinations in September. The re-examinations are scheduled for September 9 and 10.
Candidates will not have to pay another examination fee for appearing in the re-examination.
The decision has also triggered concerns about the impact of the re-examination on students' academic timelines. AISA argued that delays in UGC-NET results were already affecting PhD admissions at universities, while candidates now have to prepare again within a limited timeframe.
SFI's Delhi state committee similarly criticised the NTA's handling of the examination. It alleged that the expert committee had identified several problems, including incorrect spellings of scholars' names, distorted book titles, grammatical mistakes, poorly framed questions, and repetition of questions from earlier examinations.
"Students' futures cannot continue to be treated as collateral damage," the SFI said, demanding that the NTA be replaced by a transparent and accountable examination system.
The organisation also sought a judicial inquiry into the agency's examination failures and the circumstances behind the defective UGC-NET papers.
The Krantikari Yuva Sangathan (KYS) separately demonstrated outside the Union Ministry of Education. It opposed the cancellation of the three UGC-NET papers and demanded immediate dissolution of the NTA.
KYS alleged that police manhandled and detained protesters, including women activists, during the demonstration.
The student organisations argue that the controversy is not limited to the upcoming UGC-NET re-examination. AISA, SFI and KYS have called for broader changes to the country's examination framework, including an end to what they describe as the privatisation of public examinations.
The groups are demanding a system that is transparent, publicly controlled and accountable, arguing that examination errors can cost students months of preparation while affecting admissions, academic plans and future career opportunities.
