SC tosses out plea that sought cancellation of NEET and nearly makes lawyer pay Rs 5 lakh for bad 'advice'

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a petition that sought to conduct the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) again and to cancel the examination that was held on September 12. The plea, filed by advocate Mamta Sharma was dismissed with the judge initially slapping a cost of 5 lakh and added that the lawyer will have to bear the cost 'for giving this advice' (of filing the petition). While the court later noted that the cost will not be imposed, it warned Pradeep Gupta, one of the lawyers, that fines will be imposed if they file similar petitions again.

Their logic appeared solid. "...the court will not cancel the exam in which 7.5 lakh people have taken the exam. This exam was conducted nationally and not locally..." noted a bench led by Justice L Nageswara Rao. The bench also warned the petitioner, a 20-year-old NEET aspirant to not be adventurous with filing Writ Petitions.  

The petition had sought cancellation of NEET 2021 after allegations of a paper leak. It also sought that the National Testing Agency submit an affidavit, explaining why it should not be cancelled.  On September 7, the same group of students had sent a representation, seeking a phase II of the examination. Irked by the very nature of the petition, Justice Rao, in the beginning, asked, "What sort of writ petitions have been filed? Lakhs of people have taken the exam. When people come to you to file the petitions, don’t you think that we’ll dismiss them with costs? Do you now want to cancel the entire exam?"

Prior to filing this plea, hashtags #RENEET and #FairNEET started surfacing on Twitter, with a number of profiles of people, who claim to be students, seeking another phase of the examination.