Power Outage Disrupts NEET 2025 in Indore, HC stays results for 11 Exam Centres

Indore: The Madhya Pradesh High Court has stayed publication of the National Eligibility-Entrance Test Undergraduate (NEET-UG) exam results at 11 centres in Indore, which had faced a power outage during the UG medical entrance test held on May 4, 2025.

Even though at first the HC bench had stayed the NEET UG results for the entire country, later it modified the order after noting that the problem of power outage was limited to 11 centres only.

The High Court's order has been issued in response to a plea by a student who claimed that her performance in the NEET UG exam on May 4 was severely impacted by a power outage at her exam centre in Indore. Filing the plea before the HC bench, the petitioner prayed to be allowed to appear for the examination again.

NEET UG examination, which was held on May 4 this year, is the gateway for medical aspirants to get admitted to undergraduate medical courses across the country. However, this year, on the day of the exam, several exam centres in Indore faced a power outage because of the weather conditions.

Also Read: NEET 2025 Answer Key to Be Released Soon by NTA, Results on June 14

Explaining the issue, the petitioner's counsel, Mridul Bhagtnagar, told PTI, "Many centres set up for NEET-UG in Indore did not have generators or other alternative arrangements for electricity, even though the weather department had already issued a warning of thunderstorms in the city on May 4."

He informed that when the weather conditions deteriorated on May 4, the power supply was cut for one to two hours at many centres in the city during the three-hour entrance exam, which affected the performance of the candidates. He also claimed that due to the sudden power outage, the entrance exam was conducted in candlelight at some centres.

While considering the plea on Thursday, the HC bench put an interim stay on the declaration of the NEET UG results, a decision which was going to impact 21 lakh candidates to appeared in the test.

Justice Subodh Abhyankar, while granting interim relief to the petitioner, held that her entrance test was affected due to the power outage, and the authorities failed to provide proper conditions during the test.

"It is directed that till the next date of the hearing, the result of NEET-UG shall not be declared by the respondents," he said.

Listing the matter for further hearing on June 30, the Court had issued notices to the National Testing Agency (NTA), Central Government and Madhya Pradesh West Zone Electricity Distribution Company, which are among the respondents, and sought their reply within four weeks. The court further noted that despite directives to the respondents to take instructions on the plea, none appeared for the hearing on Thursday.

Even though the matter was listed for further hearing, the matter was heard once again on Friday when the Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta and Deputy Solicitor General Himanshu Joshi informed the Court that the High Court stayed the declaration of NEET-UG results for the entire country although the problem of power outage was confined to 11 centres in Indore.

Therefore, they prayed that NTA be allowed to declare the results for the rest of India. This prayer was opposed by the petitioner's counsel, who submitted that if the petitioner could not appear for the examination afresh in time, she would not be able to appear for counselling rounds, PTI has reported.

However, the HC bench comprising Justice Subodh Abhyankar acceded to the government lawyers' request noting that it was "inclined to modify the order passed.... on 15.05.2025, to the extent that the respondents may be allowed to declare the results for all the other centres in India, except the affected centres at Indore, in which the power failure was faced by the students, and the details of which shall be furnished by the respondents along with their reply."

The matter was, thereafter, posted for further hearing on Monday i.e. May 19, 2025.

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