Jan Suraaj founder Prashant Kishor on Friday strongly criticised the National Testing Agency (NTA) over the alleged NEET UG 2026 paper leak controversy. Criticising the nation’s apex test-conduction body, the strategist-turned-politician said that such incidents should be treated as a serious failure in the examination system.
“Even one paper leak must be considered serious threat to the whole testing system,” Kishor pointed.
Kishor’s remarks came after NTA Director General Abhishek Singh reportedly said before a parliamentary panel that the NEET UG paper was not leaked through the NTA’s internal system. The statement was made while the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) continues to probe into the matter.
Noting the seriousness, Kishor said “It will be considered a paper leak even if only one question was leaked or five were leaked, It has messed with the future of the students. They have worked hard and taken the exam, and such things have affected them." According to him, the main concern is the failure to protect the future of lakhs of students appearing for competitive examinations.
"The exam was cancelled, so how does it matter how many questions were leaked?" Kishor added, pointing out the redundancy of the NTA's defence once an exam's credibility is entirely compromised.
Following allegations of paper leaks, the NTA cancelled the examination and announced that a retest would be held on June 21. They justified the cancellation under the agency’s “zero tolerance” policy, emphasizing that any compromise of exam questions could erode public trust in competitive examinations.
Meanwhile, the CBI has expanded its investigation into the alleged leak network. Several arrests have already been made in connection with the case, including people accused of leaking and distributing examination questions before the test.
