Wednesday, May 15

NTA’s Clarification Over Foul Play in the JEE Mains Session 1 Result

Edited by Uzma Parveen
NTA Clarifies Over Foul Play in the JEE Mains Session 1 Result

The National Testing Agency (NTA) released a press note clarifying doubts regarding the conduct of session 1 of the Joint Entrance Examination (Main), 2024. JEE Main, 2024 Session 1 (January 2024) was conducted in about 544 centers in 291 cities (including 21 cities abroad), the official release says.

NTA informed that session 1 was conducted in 10 different shifts on the 27th, 29th, 30th, 31st January, and February 1. This time total of 1221624 candidates registered for the exam which is 27% above the previous year’s count of 860064.

What is the Controversy about the JEE Mains 2024?

NTA has declared the JEE Main Exam 2024 session 1 result on February 12 at the official website. As soon as the result was out, some students alleged errors in the marks obtained and percentile calculation in the JEE Main Exam. Many students raised concerns about the uneven distribution of candidates in different slots or shifts in session 1.


Students took to the social media platform X and claimed the discrepancies surrounding the marks and percentile. A user posted about JEE Mains 27 January 1st shift, saying that students with a 70-80 marks difference have got same percentile. “Around 30% of the total students appeared in this one shift pushing the percentile to abnormal highs”, a user said.

People started expressing serious concerns and disappointment over the percentile calculation. Another user wrote, “With 126 marks in 29th Jan session 2, one has got 90 percentile while the expectation with 126 marks was somewhere around 97 percentile”. People expressed disappointment regarding the result and its future outcomes. “Very unfair with students. This result has demoralized most of the genuine students”, writes he.

How does NTA calculate Percentile Score?

According to information furnished by NTA, on a scale, percentile scores range from 100 to 0 for each session of examinees. It indicates the percentage of candidates that have scored equal to or below (same or lower raw scores) that particular percentile in that examination.

So, the topper who got the highest score in each session will get the same percentile of 100. The marks obtained between the highest and lowest scores are also converted to necessary percentiles.

The formula to calculate the JEE Main 2024 percentile is (100 x number of candidates who appeared in the session with a raw score equal to or less than the candidate) / total number of candidates who appeared in that session.

According to the policy, the NTA does not release the raw scores and it only releases the percentile. The Percentile Score is the Normalized Score for the examination instead of the raw marks of the candidate. NTA uses the percentile for the preparation of the merit lists. In the event of the percentiles for the multi-shifts being dissimilar or unequal, the lowest will be the eligibility cut-off for that category for all candidates (i.e. all shifts). “Raw marks obtained by the candidates in different shifts/sessions are converted to NTA Score”, informs NTA.

How does the NTA distribute candidates and select question papers in different shifts?

As informed by the NTA, the date, shift, and slot of examination are randomly allotted to students by the computer following the normalization process. NTA ensured that during Session 1, each shift will get an equal distribution of candidate count, gender, and category.

NTA informed that as per the norms followed, various Question papers of a similar nature in content are usually prepared and randomly selected for different shifts without prior knowledge of the difficulty level of each Question paper.

How does NTA ensure a level playing field in terms of scores despite having multiple shifts?

The examination is conducted in multiple shifts and varied difficulty levels in Question papers are an inherent part of the examination, so the Normalisation method is preferred to decide scores.

The “Normalization procedure based on Percentile Score” is used to ensure that candidates’ scores remain unaffected by the difficulty level of the examination. No one neither benefits nor is disadvantaged due to multiple shifts.

The normalisation process ensures that all candidates appearing in a single shift are administered the same question paper with jumbled questions and options. In this sense, they are being tested on a level playing field. It is a common practice that, in such a case, a candidate who scores higher marks is ranked above those who get lower marks. For instance, if a candidate scores 75 marks will always be ranked higher than any other candidate who scores 70.

What is the Normalisation Procedure used by NTA?

Normalization Procedure is an internationally accepted system that is designed for direct comparison between candidates’ marks by transforming the marks onto a common scale. The normalization process for JEE is available in the Information Bulletin of JEE (Main) – 2024.

What clarification has NTA given surrounding the allegations?

Through the released press note NTA has clarified that to ensure a homogenous nature and equal distribution of candidates it followed the Normalization Procedure based on the November 2018 report of the Committee of Experts consisting of reputed professors of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), and the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).

By showing the Male, and Female female-wise distribution table for different shifts NTA rejected any claims surrounding the unequal distribution of candidates in different shifts. NTA claimed that it provided fair and equal opportunity for all candidates.