NEET 2026: Bombay HC's Aurangabad bench dismisses OMR tampering pleas, fines petitioners Rs 5,000

NEET 2026: Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court has dismissed the petitions of candidates who had filed complaints based on tampered OMRs and has also imposed a penalty of Rs 5,000 on each petitioner to pay to the National Testing Agency (NTA)

According to the sources, four candidates, namely, Atharva, Hricha, Soham, and Rahul, had filed writ petitions alleging tampered OMR answer sheets and incorrect evaluation in the NEET UG 2026 re-exam conducted on June 21.

The Aurangabad bench dismissed the petitions of two candidates on merit, after examining their original OMR sheets and hearing NTA's submissions. While the remaining two students withdrew their petitions.

Also read NEET UG 2026 Counselling: MCC rolls out online seat upgrade, resignation facility

NEET students approached NTA

NTA added that all four students had raised the same claim with NTA and received a reply through the established OMR challenge process and grievance before approaching the Court. Students will now have to submit a penalty of Rs 5,000 paid to NTA.

Earlier, NTA, in a statement, had already cautioned candidates against false claims of OMR tampering. The testing agency was closely monitoring and scrutinizing all complaints and found fake or AI-generated.

Also read NEET Counselling 2026: In NMC’s new rules for PwBD admissions, individualised reports, chance to appeal

Student alleges discrepancies in NTA OMR sheet

In another complaint by an aspirant from Karnataka, Bindushree Jagdish Pawar has alleged discrepancies in the re-NEET 2026 OMR sheet issued by NTA. She claimed that the OMR sheets did not show the answers she marked during the exam.

Pawar alleged that the OMR sheet given by NTA on July 16 shows she answered only 41 out of 180 questions, for which she was given a score of -11. However, she claims she actually attempted 165 questions, and if evaluated using the final answer key, she should have secured 668 marks.

NTA re-exam results were announced on July 16. The re-NEET 2026 was held after claims of paper was circulated on social media. Notably, the former education minister had earlier announced that NEET 2027 will be held in a CBT mode.