In the aftermath of Sunday's National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG 2025), social media platforms have erupted with memes and jokes as 22.7 lakh medical aspirants process their collective trauma through humour.
The National Testing Agency (NTA)-conducted examination, which many are now dubbing "the toughest paper in 37 years," has inspired a creative outpouring of despair and wit across X ( formerly Twitter).
"Any competitive exam especially when being taken by >2.5 million students SHOULD BE difficult and analytical!" posted user @apexpredator_36 and added, "From 67 candidates getting perfect 720/720 last year, I would be surprised if anyone crosses 700 this time NTA really upped the game this time with #NEET2025."
The unprecedented difficulty level of this year's examination has become legendary overnight, with one user (@amjaviya) posting a humorous dialogue between previous NEET papers: "NEET 2016: I'm the toughest... NEET 2019: I tried; still, 16 was the toughest... Le NEET 2025: Papa hu mai is duniya ka papa (I am the father of this world, the toughest exam in the last 37 years). I'm leaving now."
The Physics section, in particular, seems to have left a trail of traumatised students.
User @AaqibMushtaq00 posted, "Pov: NEET students coming out from their exam halls (after getting absolutely destroyed in physics)," capturing the sentiment of countless aspirants who found themselves bewildered by the section's multi-step questions and complex calculations.
@GaganPratapMath humourously observed, "NEET's paper was designed in such a way that even if it leaked, nobody could solve it." They added, "Some students did so poorly on the NEET paper that they're heading straight to AIIMS."
User @AK____0_0 shared a particularly pointed observation: "Aur karo case file.. #NEET2025" (roughly translated as "Go ahead, file more court cases..."), apparently referencing the revenge by NTA after numerous legal challenges that have surrounded the NEET exam last year with all the paper leak controversy — only for students to face an even more formidable test.
The difficulty of this year's paper has even spawned comparisons to previous challenging years, with @Jaatp04 declaring, "NEET 2025 is the Toughest Paper Till Now, Surpassing NEET 2016."
Meanwhile, @diazoniumnamak lamented, "NTA this time: They showered too much 'love' on physics this year,"
Of course, by “love,” the students mean Physics was so overwhelmingly present and difficult, it practically suffocated the paper, capturing the sentiment of thousands who felt particularly targeted by the Physics section's increased complexity.
Education experts noted that, unlike previous years, where the NTA released 24 paper sets, this year saw only four sets with uniformly difficult questions designed to test analytical thinking rather than rote memorisation.
While the NTA’s intention was to make the exam fairer and test deeper understanding, the immediate emotional response from aspirants suggests it may have created a mini-existential crisis for thousands.
In the meantime, aspiring doctors can take comfort in knowing that if they survived this year's Physics section, performing actual brain surgery might seem like a relaxing Sunday activity in comparison.
Note: Some social media posts contain colourful language that has been toned down for publication purposes.
