UGC NET June 2026: NTA issues clarification over ‘too expensive’ answer key challenge fee

The National Testing Agency (NTA) recently issued a clarification over provisional answer key challenge fee. The testing agency addressed the controversy around costly objection facility to challenge UGC NET answer key. Candidates were required to pay ₹200 fee per question to raise objections for which the window opened on the same day — 16 August — when the provisional answer key was released.

Alongside UGC NET, NTA also released answer keys for Joint CSIR UGC NET, ⁠ICAR AIEEA (PG) & AICE (PhD) and opened objection window. Rejecting claims that the fee is "too expensive", NTA in a post on X stated, “The answer key challenge system is designed to be fair to every student, not just the one who challenges.”

The premier and autonomous institution listed two pointers justifying the fee charged. Suggesting that one challenge benefits all, NTA stated, “If even a single candidate challenges a question, and the subject experts accept the challenge, the revised answer key applies to every candidate who wrote the exam.”

Further emphasizing that fee is refunded in full if challenge is accepted, NTA said, “The ₹200/question is refunded to the candidate whose challenge is upheld. The fee exists to discourage frivolous challenges, not to profit from genuine ones.” Concluding the post NTA reiterated, “One accurate challenge from any candidate can correct the record for lakhs of others.”

NTA conducts the UGC NET exam twice a year in online computer-based test mode for the award of Junior Research Fellowship, eligibility for Assistant Professor, and admission to PhD programmes in Indian Universities. The UGC NET June 2026 exam was conducted between 22 and 30 June, covering 87 subjects. NTA is yet to publish the revised final answer on its official website.

NTA cancels UGC NET exam for 3 subjects

NTA released UGC NET provisional answer key for a total of 84 subjects, leaving English, Commerce and Sociology. The testing agency scrapped the June exam conducted for these subjects citing several complaints on multiple errors in these papers.

A committee was formed to assess the degree of errors which found that the three papers had “many factual, typographical, 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.” Hence, these exams were cancelled, and 9th and 10th September were declared as re-examination dates.