📰 From the news · Fake admission / seat promise
Proxy candidates at three centres, 14 biometric staff arrested, deals of Rs 30-40 lakh: the solver gang caught at the NEET-UG re-test in Lakhisarai
NEET-UG is the only door into an MBBS seat in India, and in 2026 the door had to be rebuilt. According to the Free Press Journal, the National Testing Agency cancelled the 3 May exam amid a probe into alleged question-paper leaks and held a re-test on 21 June for more than 22 lakh candidates at 5,440 centres. A day later, police in Lakhisarai district in Bihar announced that they had broken up a gang that had put impostors into the examination halls, with medical students sitting the paper for paying candidates.
According to Business Today on 22 June 2026, the first person detained was Mayank Kashyap, a third-year MBBS student at Patna Medical College and Hospital, who entered Hasanpur High School posing as an employee of the biometric verification company. Police then raided KRK Higher Secondary School and Kendriya Vidyalaya in Lakhisarai, arrested seven candidates, and arrested 14 employees of the biometric company. Business Today put the total arrested at 24. Those named by police included students of ANM Medical College and Hospital in Gaya, AIIMS Rae Bareli, Nalanda Medical College and Hospital, an intern at a Delhi medical college and a nursing student at Banaras Hindu University who was allegedly caught sitting the exam as another candidate. Investigators described the alleged mastermind as a medical student at the Gaya college who had earlier been questioned by the CBI in the 2024 NEET paper-leak case. Medical colleges had instructed students not to leave campus during the exam, and institutions including PMCH ran seminars and quizzes as monitoring measures; some students were absent.
The Free Press Journal, also on 22 June, reported preliminary findings that deals of Rs 30 lakh and Rs 40 lakh had been struck to secure admissions, that mobile phones and documents were seized, and that the alleged mastermind had been arrested. Lakhisarai Superintendent of Police Prerna Kumar said the probe was examining the full extent of the network and whether similar activities took place at other centres.
The mechanism was insider access to the one check meant to stop impersonation. A proxy can only sit an exam if the fingerprint and photograph match at the door, so the gang reached the staff running the biometric desks, and one of its members walked into a centre dressed as one of them. Police believe the medical and nursing students were recruited to impersonate genuine aspirants.
For families the lesson is that a 'guaranteed seat' sold before the exam is either a lie or a crime, and the buyer is arrested alongside the seller. The genuine candidate whose place a proxy takes loses the exam and faces prosecution. Nobody can sell a NEET rank; the only route to an MBBS seat is the candidate's own score and the counselling run by the MCC or the state.
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This is a news-sourced case summary written by the TrustMBBS team, not a first-person account; see the sources above. They reflect one person's experience and are not a verdict on any institution. Report your own: Report a scam or tell your story.