As the protests on "vote theft" are hitting the streets, the Congress has opened up the ruling party's old wounds. On Sunday, it accused the Modi government and the National Testing Agency (NTA) of failing to address examination irregularities, citing a Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education report under the chairmanship of Mukul Wasnig.
It also accused the former Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan of dismissing this Standing Committee's previous recommendations on reforming the NTA because the Committee ‘had members of the Opposition in it.’ "We can only hope that the Modi government sheds its arrogance for the limited time it has remaining and takes this report seriously," the statement mentions.
In a statement issued on October 11, Congress general secretary (communications) Jairam Ramesh highlighted six key findings from the report titled Reforms and Strengthening of the National Testing Agency (NTA).
Ramesh alleged that the Ministry of Education made a “blatantly false and audacious claim” before the committee that no paper leak occurred in an NTA-conducted examination between its formation in 2017 and 2025.
“There have been 9 paper leaks and irregularities in NTA-conducted exams that we know of,” he said, questioning the prospects of a fair investigation and accountability when the Ministry refused to acknowledge the failures.
The Congress also raised concerns about the NTA's institutional structure, noting that it is registered as a society under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, rather than a statutory body established by an Act of Parliament. Ramesh argued that this arrangement left the agency with limited accountability and parliamentary oversight.
Highlighting staffing shortages, he said the NTA had only 39 sanctioned positions, of which 23 were occupied, leaving 41 per cent of the posts vacant. "This is despite the emphasis of the K Radhakrishnan Committee on building the NTA’s staff strength," the statement read.
He also noted that all permanent posts were filled through deputation, with officers serving two- to three-year tenures, which he said prevented the development of institutional expertise.
The statement further flagged the absence of a nationwide blacklist of firms that had failed to provide examination-related services. It alleged that firms blacklisted in one state routinely secured government contracts in other states.
Ramesh also questioned the transparency of NEET-UG results, saying that the absence of publicly accessible results and test-centre-wise data made it difficult to detect unusual patterns in candidates' performance and examination centres.
On the agency's leadership, the Congress general secretary alleged that the Modi government had failed to appoint a full-time Director General between the NEET paper-leak controversies of 2024 and 2026, despite the need to implement reforms recommended by the K. Radhakrishnan Committee.
"The NTA has become a financial profit-making business," the statement added. The statement also claimed that the NTA had earned a revenue surplus of ₹590 crore, which was invested in fixed deposits to earn interest instead of being used to assist students or strengthen examination infrastructure and capabilities.
