New Delhi Jun 11 : The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued notice to the Centre and the National Testing Agency (NTA) on a petition seeking the cancellation of the National Entrance-cum-Eligibility Test (NEET) exam held this year for the Under-Graduate(UG) Medical courses over an alleged paper leak.

A vacation bench comprising Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah posted the matter to July 8 seeking a response from the National Testing Agency (NTA).

The counsel for the NTA told the court that the petition be tagged along with an earlier petition on which notice was issued by a bench led by the Chief Justice of India on May 17.

That petition is listed on July 8, he informed. The bench then posted the present petition along with the earlier petition which is listed on July 8.

Advocate Mathews J Nedumpara, appearing for the petitioners, sought a stay of the counselling.

The bench refused to stay saying,”We are not stopping the counselling, ” Justice Nath said.

The petition was filed by Shivangi Mishra and nine others on June 1 before the declaration of the results.

After the declaration of the results, a few more petitions have been filed in the Apex Court questioning the decision of the NTA to award grace marks to several candidates.

The petitions, which were filed after the declaration of results, were not listed today.

The writ petition filed under Article 32 of the Constitution seeks to direct the National Testing Agency to conduct the exam again given the allegations of the paper leak. Raising doubts about the sanctity of the exam held on May 5, the petitioners seek to cancel the exam.

The Top Court had on May 17, refused to stay the declaration of the results of the NEET-UG exam.

Though the bench led by CJI DY Chandrachud issued notice on that petition and posted the matter to July, the bench did not stay the results of the exams saying that the exam held on a pan-India basis cannot be stayed.

UNI