NEET leak: Why computer-based testing is also problematic
Expert says hasty reforms risk deepening inequity and that only structural change, not CBI probes, can fix NEET's recurring integrity crisis
Any move to shift NEET to computer-based testing must be phased carefully — or it risks replacing one crisis with another. That is the warning from Maheshwer Peri, founder and chairman of Careers360, India's most-read education media platform, in the wake of NEET-UG 2026’s cancellation.
“If you announce computer-based testing overnight, you immediately exclude students from villages who have never sat in front of a computer,” Peri said in an interview to Rediff.com.
“They will simply drop out of NEET. That is a real and serious risk to equity.” For a test that already sits at the centre of debates about access and fairness, a poorly executed digital shift could quietly shut out the very students it is meant to serve.
What went wrong this time
The National Testing Agency cancelled NEET-UG 2026 on May 12 — nine days after 22.79 lakh students sat the exam on May 3.
The trigger: Rajasthan Police’s Special Operations Group (SOG) confirmed that roughly 140 of 180 questions matched a ‘guess paper’ circulating on WhatsApp at least a fortnight before exam day.
Students were allegedly charged Rs 3–5 lakh for access to the leaked paper — reportedly handwritten, scanned, and distributed via WhatsApp by an accused candidate's son.
Fifteen people have been questioned; one BJP functionary arrested. The CBI is now tracing a money trail through Sikar, Jhunjhunu, Nagaur, Dehradun, Jaipur and Kerala.
Why cheating is rational — and organised
The root cause, Peri argues, is financial logic, not moral failure. A government medical college seat costs roughly Rs 5 lakh over five years; a private seat costs Rs 1.5 crore. “The incentive to cheat is Rs 1.45 crore. That is not a small amount,” he said. Sophisticated, coordinated networks form around that gap — and re-form every cycle, because nothing about the underlying economics changes.
The human cost
Students who spent two years preparing, relocated to coaching hubs, and were home resting after the exam bore the immediate blow. “They cry. They actually cry,” Peri said. “The academic disruption is one thing. The emotional disruption is another matter altogether.”
What will actually fix it
Peri is unambiguous: CBI investigations are necessary but insufficient. “As long as three hours of one examination determine the entire future of a student, you will have students — and parents — doing everything they can to make those three hours work in their favour.”
The fix is structural — reducing the all-or-nothing weight of a single exam. Every response so far has been investigative. That, he says, is precisely why this keeps happening.