Yesterday, July 6, the National Testing Agency (NTA) issued the provisional answer keys, as well as the response sheets of aspirants who appeared for the University Grants Commission - National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) 2025, June session.
However, candidates who appeared for the exam were met with a slow website, defunct captcha and technical difficulties that the NTA has now become infamous for, when they tried to access the provisional answer keys and their response sheets.
A few candidates even took to X (formerly known as Twitter) to air out this grievance.
When the website eventually began to load properly, a few candidates were in for yet another rude awakening — the answers in their response sheets were not the same ones they had marked in the exam.
The issue was even raised by UGC-NET educator and Sociology researcher at South Asian University, Delhi, Antara Chakrabarty through a post on her X (formerly known as Twitter) account.
“How long are helpless aspirants going to tolerate this? Please look into it immediately (.sic),” Chakrabarty wrote in her post, which garnered responses from several aspirants, claiming to have faced similar issues.
Speaking to EdexLive, she admitted that she did not fully grasp how widespread the problem was when students started raising the issue. “I didn’t think much of it, and thought that the candidates were mistaken. I even advised my students not to panic,” she said.
However, she changed her mind once students started pointing out the questions for which they were marked wrong. “These were basic general knowledge questions. There was no way for anyone with a strong awareness of current affairs, let alone students who prepared for UGC-NET, could have gotten them wrong,” she said.
Further, she claimed that the NTA offered no way of redressal for this issue. “When students raised the matter with the NTA, officials told them that they could not change their response sheets, as it was a computer-based test (CBT). They simply asked candidates to challenge the answers,” she narrated.
This was not a feasible solution, as the NTA charges Rs 200 per question for candidates who want to raise challenges to the answer keys.
According to Chakrabarty, such technical difficulties and lack of support for candidates are indicative of larger issues within the NTA and how it conducts exams.
“Last year, the NTA arbitrarily changed the mode of examination to pen-and-paper, and shifted back to CBT after the UGC-NET was cancelled due to security concerns in an equally arbitrary fashion. The website frequently experiences glitches and technical difficulties, and discrepancies with answer keys occur annually. Nobody within the NTA is answerable for all these issues,” she fumed, speaking to EdexLive.
Unfortunately, students with contestations in their response sheets are left with no way to correct or amend them, as their response sheets stand as the final proof of their performance in the exam, she explained.
“This is really concerning, as these marks determine their eligibility for scholarships. There are many candidates who have reached the maximum age threshold and cannot attempt the exam anymore,” she added.
Interestingly, similar errors have been reported in the response sheets of the Joint Entrance Exam (Mains) 2025, which is also conducted by the NTA.
This is part of an ongoing story. EdexLive will publish accounts of these discrepancies from UGC-NET June 2025 candidates shortly.
