‘Recipe for disaster’: Why the NTA’s lack of transparency matters
Given that the agency plays an immense role in the lives of millions of young Indians, the lack of clarity about its functioning is indefensible.
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Is the National Testing Agency a public body or a private one? This is one of the key questions that has been raised in the controversy about the agency and its litany of failures in at least three crucial public examinations that it conducts.
Journalists and academics argued that as a society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, the agency is a private body, although it has permission to use the emblem of the Indian government.
They circulated images of the agency’s certificate of registration and drew attention to the fact that it advised anyone dealing with it to make the “necessary verification (on their own)” of the organisation’s assets and liabilities “before entering into any contract/assignment with them”.
The certificate also stated that the organisation cannot use the “translated/abbreviated/acronym name and shall use the original name only with the caption that it is governed by a private body/ society and not government”.
In response to the criticism, the Press Information Bureau put out a post on X stating that the National Testing Agency fell within the ambit of the Right to Information law and that key personnel were appointed by the government. Two days later, the agency itself put out a post stating that...
