This comes just days after the NTA denied netizens' claims that the NEET re-test paper, scheduled for June 21, had also been leaked.

This comes just days after the NTA denied netizens' claims that the NEET re-test paper, scheduled for June 21, had also been leaked.

This comes just days after the NTA denied netizens' claims that the NEET re-test paper, scheduled for June 21, had also been leaked.

Amid ongoing backlash over the NEET paper leak case, which led to a string of student suicides, a parliamentary panel on Sunday asked the National Testing Agency (NTA) to define what constitutes a "paper leak", and whether any such leaks had taken place since 2018.

This comes a week after NTA officials claimed to the panel that the actual question paper had not been leaked, and that questions from a guess paper were being circulated.

It also comes just days after the rumours of the NEET re-test paper being leaked as well, ahead of its scheduled date of June 21.

The backlash over the CBSE's On-Screen Marking (OSM) system is also a key focus area for the Parliamentary Committee for Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, headed by Congress member Digvijaya Singh.

Top government officials from both the NTA and the CBSE have now been ordered by the committee to submit a written response detailing the alleged issues around the paper leak and the OSM system, as per a PTI report.

Specifically, the NTA officials were asked whether they had conducted any inquiry into the alleged irregularities in the NEET-UG 2024 examination—outside of the CBI investigations.

The agency was also asked about its staff strength over the past three years, in addition to details of recruitments made since 2022.

The panel has also sought the annual reports that the NTA had submitted to the Higher Education Department over the same period, as well as a detailed report that showed the agency's response to each of the 101 recommendations made by the Radhakrishnan Committee.

The point of the committee, instituted by former ISRO chief K. Radhakrishnan, was to recommend reforms to improve how the NTA conducted its exams.

The panel also questioned CBSE about various alleged issues behind its OSM system.

These were earlier flagged by Class 12 student Sarthak Sidhant, who explained a detailed list of alleged issues behind the board's deal with Coempt EduTeck—the firm awarded the contract for the OSM system.

The panel questioned CBSE officials on whether it had known about Coempt's background, and also questioned why changes were made in various versions of the Requests for Proposals (RFPs) for the OSM system.

Other aspects of the alleged changes in the RFPs that Sidhant had flagged were also questioned, such as the change in the blacklisting rule, why the turnover benchmark was set at Rs 50 crore, and why the minimum scanning resolution was reduced from 300 DPI to 200 DPI—a major reason behind thousands of furious students and parents claiming that answer sheets on the system were blurred, and that marking had not been done properly.

While the CBSE—which has not yet submitted the various versions of the RFPs to the panel—has to answer the questions by June 8, the NTA has until June 10 to answer them.