The Madhya Pradesh High Court while hearing a batch of over 100 petitions directed the NTA to conduct a re-examination for NEET-UG 2025 candidates who faced significant disruption due to power outages at exam centres in Indore and Ujjain on 4 May 2025.
The single judge bench comprising of Justice Subodh Abhyankar held that even a temporary interruption especially during a high-stakes national medical entrance exam could undermine candidates’ performance and violate the equality principle under Article 14 of the Constitution.
The Court noted that although statistical reports and government committees claimed no significant performance deviation, these analyses failed to adequately consider the emotional and psychological impact on examinees during the blackout.
The Court further clarified that the re-test will be available only to petitioners who had filed cases before 3 June 2025, i.e., before the release of the provisional answer key. These students will be ranked solely based on their re-test scores, and the result will determine their eligibility in the counselling process. The counselling, set to begin on 1 July 2025, will be subject to re-test outcomes.
Advocates appearing for the case :Â
Shri Mradul Bhatnagar, Shri Akash Sharma, Shri N.S. Bhati, Shri Nitin Vyas, Shri Amit Raj, Shri Rajnish Yadav, Shri Aman Mourya, Shri Prakhar Karpe, Shri Chinmay Mehta, Shri Dharmedra Thakur, Shri Atul Bukhariya, Shri Madhusudan Dwivedi, Ms. Sapna Patwa, Shri Ajay Ukas, Shri Akash Sharma, Ms. Kirti Patwardhan, Shri Jaswant Singh Chouhan, Shri Rahul Yadav, Ms. Deesha Goyal, Shri Ashish Choubey, Shri Vikas Jain and Shri Arjun Pathak – Advocates for their respective petitioners.
Shri Tushar Mehta – Solicitor General of India with Shri Rupesh Kumar – Senior Advocate with Shri Romesh Dave – Deputy Solicitor General of India assisted by Ms. Pankhuri Shrivastava, Ms. Diksha Paliwal, Ms. Bhumika Dwivedi and Shri Atharava Dave – Advocates for the respondents.
Read Order
