NEET candidate delay: Bengaluru Traffic Police’s ‘fact check’ refutes blame on Congress rally

2 min readBengaluruUpdated: Jun 23, 2026 01:26 PM IST

Candidates arrived to write the NEET exam for the second time in one and a half months, on June 21. (Express photo by Vishal Srivastava)

After allegations that a few candidates reached their NEET centre late due to a Congress rally, Bengaluru Traffic Police Tuesday released a “Fact Check’ report ruling out the same.

The report based on ‘CCTV analysis’ on one such candidate showed the examinee left home only 33 minutes before the prescribed cut-off for entry at the examination centre.

CCTV analysis and route verification have established that the NEET candidate reached the examination centre after the stipulated cutoff time. Traffic conditions were found to be normal, and traffic police personnel facilitated movement wherever required. The delay was primarily… pic.twitter.com/1bxQ7jgiKM

— ಬೆಂಗಳೂರು ಸಂಚಾರ ಪೊಲೀಸ್ BengaluruTrafficPolice (@blrcitytraffic) June 23, 2026

The timeline established by analysing the CCTV footage also showed that the candidate took a longer route and reached the centre 3 minutes after the stipulated cut-off time.

The report said mentioned the traffic conditions were normal and ruled out any congestion due to any public event.

Even the traffic personnel on duty were seen to facilitate the candidate’s movement when and wherever required, the report said citing the CCTV analysis.

NEET was conducted on Sunday, a second time and a half months after the previous examination was cancelled following a scandalous paper leak.

The same day, certain local channels aired visuals, showing three female students weeping outside the examination centre in Bengaluru after being disallowed from taking the exam for reportedly arriving late.

This drew criticism from BJP MP Tejasvi Surya, who alleged that the NEET students reached a Bengaluru exam centre late due to a Congress rally.

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Karnataka Home Minister Priyank Kharge, however, dismissed the blame as an “ill-founded” accusation, saying only three students arrived late at the RC College examination centre in central Bengaluru and that there were varied reasons for them being barred from entering the exam halls.