NTA uploads, removes answer keys for JEE Mains from website

The National Testing Agency (NTA) on Thursday removed the final answer keys for the bachelor of technology (BTech) exam of session 2 its Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) main, barely an hour after uploading it on its official website. The agency, however, did not provide a reason for the same.

Earlier, NTA dropped two Physics questions — one each in domestic and in international — from its final answer keys.

NTA, in its information bulletin for JEE main 2025 issued on October 28, 2024, said that it will drop a question if it was found to be incorrect. “The reason could be due to human error or technical error,” NTA said. According to rules, if a question is dropped, full four marks are awarded to all candidates irrespective of whether they attempted that question or not.

This is not the first time the agency has dropped questions in the final answer key. NTA dropped 12 questions in paper 1 of JEE main session 1; and six questions in session 1 and four questions in session 2 for paper 1 of JEE main 2024.

The agency, which has been roiled by controversies around paper leaks ever since the conduct of National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG) 2024, is now facing complaints of errors in provisional and the final answer keys JEE Main 2025 exam, one of India’s most crucial engineering entrance tests.

Students and teachers at coaching institutes have alleged that NTA has made mistakes in its final answer key which was uploaded and later deleted.

Udayveer Singh, who sat for the exam in the first shift on April 3 in Jalandhar, said, “NTA has dropped one question from its final answer key for my shift. The correct answer for a magnetic field question in Physics was the value of 1, and it was correct in the provisional answer key, but NTA changed the answer to the value of 5 in the final answer key. Another question about an ammeter in Physics had the value of 5 as the correct answer, but it was wrongly given as value of 125 in the provisional answer key, and NTA did not correct it in the final answer key. This will cost us a deduction of one mark and can affect our results.”

Purnima Kaul, founder of online coaching platform JEE 1 said, “NTA in its final answer key has fixed two options as correct for two questions in two different shifts on different dates and has dropped one question for domestic centres.”

NTA did not respond to HT’s queries seeking response on allegations.

NTA is yet to announce the JEE main paper 1 of session 2 results. Top 2,50,000 successful JEE main candidates will be eligible for JEE (advanced) which is scheduled to be conducted by Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) Kanpur on May 18 for admission to engineering courses at 23 IITs.