- NTA reconducts UGC-NET for English, Commerce, Sociology.
- Decision due to multiple errors in June question papers.
- Re-exams scheduled for September 9 and 10.
The National Testing Agency (NTA) has decided to reconduct the University Grants Commission National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) for English, Commerce and Sociology after a committee identified multiple errors in the question papers used during the June examination.
The UGC-NET was conducted between June 22 and June 30 this year. The decision to hold fresh examinations for the three subjects comes after candidates raised concerns over errors in the question papers, including factual, typographical and translation-related mistakes.
The development is another setback for the NTA, which has faced scrutiny over the conduct of major entrance and eligibility examinations this year. The May 3 NEET-UG 2026 examination was also scrapped following a paper leak, triggering nationwide protests and a 37-day-long CJP-led student protest at Jantar Mantar. The protests eventually resulted in the resignation of then Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
UGC-NET is conducted to determine candidates’ eligibility for the posts of Assistant Professor and admission to PhD programmes.
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Why is NTA reconducting three UGC-NET papers?
The NTA said it constituted a committee to examine complaints received about the English, Commerce and Sociology question papers. After reviewing the papers, the committee recommended that the examinations be conducted again.
“The Committee found that the three papers had many factual, typographical, and translation errors, including misspelt names of prominent scholars, garbled book titles, errors in the stem wording of questions, grammatical errors, gender and number agreement errors, punctuation mistakes, and non-standard coined terms for established concepts, as well as repetition of a significant number of questions previously administered. The Committee recommended that, in the interest of holding a fair and error-free examination, these three papers should be reconducted," the NTA said.
The committee’s findings covered several types of errors, including incorrect spellings of scholars’ names, distorted book titles, problems with the wording of questions, grammatical and punctuation mistakes, and the use of non-standard terms. It also found that a significant number of questions had been repeated from earlier examinations.
UGC-NET re-exam dates
The NTA has scheduled the fresh examinations for September 9 and 10.
The English examination will be conducted on September 9 from 9am to 12pm, while the Commerce paper will take place on the same day from 3pm to 6pm.
The Sociology examination is scheduled for September 10 from 9am to 12pm.
“Further details of the city, centre, and admit card details will be notified separately on the official website. No additional examination fee will be charged from the candidates of these three subjects for the re-conduct,” the NTA added.
According to HT report, at least 14 questions in the English paper were repeated from the December 2024 examination. The Commerce paper was also reported to have similar issues.
The UGC-NET examination consists of two papers. Paper I has 50 questions covering areas such as teaching aptitude, reasoning ability and general awareness.
Paper II consists of 100 multiple-choice questions based on the candidate’s chosen subject. The examination is used to assess eligibility for Assistant Professor positions and PhD admissions.