Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Friday said the government will not tolerate any malpractices or irregularities in the conduct of exams and accountability of the National Testing Agency (NTA) will be fixed if lapses are found.

“In previous years, the NEET syllabus wasn’t cut down. This year we also aligned the questions with the state boards’ syllabus. Less syllabus and more candidates also led to the rise in competition and ultimately increase in the number of top scorers,” he was quoted as saying by The New Indian Express.

“Every aspect is being looked into and accountability will be defined and depending on the nature of lapse action will be taken,” Pradhan further said while denying any malpractice or irregularities in the examination.

“The government is committed to protecting the interests of the examinees. Concerns of students will be addressed with fairness and equity. Facts related to the NEET-UG examination are in cognisance of the Supreme Court. Counselling process of NEET-UG will be underway soon and it is of utmost importance to move ahead in this direction without any confusion,” the Minister added.

Pradhan also met some NEET-UG aspirants and their parents on Friday. He assured them that no injustice would be done to the students.

“Students who wanted to meet us today, I called them, their parents also came, I met them. I heard their side, and I made them feel better. The government is committed, and all students should have this assurance that a transparent process will be followed,” Pradhan told ANI.

“Whatever doubts come to their minds, some issues came to mind that some irregularities in the centre were noticed, due to lack of time for grace marks, some objections were raised in the formula used for giving grace marks, that was also rectified,” he added.