NEET 2017: Supreme Court orders CBSE to declare results by June 26

Candidates who appeared for NEET 2017 will finally be able to heave a sigh of relief as the Supreme Court has overruled the Madras High Court's stay and ordered the Central Board of Secondary Examination to declare the results. The NEET 2017 results are now likely to be declared by June 26. 

The apex court also asked high courts all over the country not to entertain any petition on the matter. 

Hoping to end the uncertainty around NEET 2017 results, the Supreme Court will hear the Central Board of Secondary Education's plea today, June 12. The Madras High Court had on May 24 put an interim stay on the declaration of results after a petition had challenged the different sets of question papers for English and other vernacular languages.

The case will be heard by the apex court's vacation bench of Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice Deepak Gupta, after Maninder Singh, additional solicitor general, requested for an urgent hearing, reported NDTV. The bench will also hear a plea regarding the transfer of pending NEET cases in the Madras and Gujarat High Courts.

The declaration of the much-awaited results will now depend on today's hearing at the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile on June 9, the Centre had asked the Madras High Court to lift the stay on the results. For this, the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare filed an affidavit at the Madras High Court, urging it to lift the stay.

While doing so, the ministry's under secretary A. Amit Biswas had also defended CBSE's decision to give out separate sets of question papers and refuted claims that the that the English question papers were tougher than those in vernacular languages.

"CBSE had conducted NEET for the academic year 2013-14. CBSE was also conducting All India Pre Medical Test (AIPMT) for admission in 15% MBBS/BDS seats in government medical/dental colleges throughout the country except for the States of Andhra Pradesh/Telangana and Jammu and Kashmir," The Hindu quoted Biswas as saying.

"Some of the State Governments were also using the AIPMT merit list for making admission to medical/dental courses in their States from the academic year 2014-15."

It is also being said that students who appeared for NEET exams this year can expect their results after June 13. The results were earlier supposed to be declared on June 8, but CBSE said that it would need about 15 days to declare the results after the court lifts the stay. It also said that the stay needs to be lifted soon as the future of about 11.38 lakh students is currently hanging by a thread.

"The delay in declaring results due to the interim order is already beyond permissible limit. The CBSE will require 15 days to declare the result if it is permitted to do so," the Times of India quoted the CBSE counsel as saying.

The NEET exams were held on May 7 in 10 languages.