The Centre on Friday notified the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024, which is meant to curb malpractices in public exams.
The Parliament had passed the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024 in February in the 17th Lok Sabha during the second term of the Narendra Modi government.
The notification of the anti-cheating law has come at a time when the government is facing criticism over a series of alleged paper leaks and other irregularities in a number of exams. The medical entrance exam NEET, the UGC-NEET, and CSIR-UGC-NEET are some of the exams that are under the scanner.
Earlier in the day, the National Testing Agency (NTA) of the Union government had announced the postponement of the CSIR-UGC-NEET exam for “unavoidable circumstances as well as logistic issues”. The exam was scheduled to be held on June 25-27.
The anti-cheating law carries punishment of prison terms from three to ten years for a range of offences. It also includes provisions for the attachment of property.
The law mandates punishment of a minimum of three to five years of imprisonment to curb cheating and 5-10 years of imprisonment and a minimum fine of Rs 1 crore for those involved in organised crimes of cheating.
Previously, the Ministry of Education (MoE) on Wednesday had cancelled the UGC-NET exam. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the MoE said the exam was cancelled on the basis of inputs from Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) that indicated that the “integrity of the examination may have been compromised”. It further said that the matter had been referred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for a probe.
In a press conference on Thursday, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said the Union government will appoint a high-level panel to look into the functioning of the NTA for lapses in holding the examinations. He further said that the UGC-NET exam was cancelled after the paper was leaked on darknet and was circulating on messaging application Telegram.
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