Noida: At 7.30am, candidates began arriving. Biometric verification was done by 8.30am. The exam was scheduled to begin at 9am. But till 11am, no one had any answers.“The system failed us again. They kept us waiting for three hours with no communication, then simply asked us to go home,” said Anshika Mishra, 18, tears rolling down her face as she walked out of the examination centre in Sector 64 on Saturday.For thousands of Cuet-UG aspirants, what should have been one of the most important days of their academic lives dissolved into hours of chaos, confusion and helpless waiting in the scorching heat. Technical glitches cancelled the morning slot and threw the second shift into disarray at Aadarsh Pariksha Kendra, which was handling nearly 2,000 candidates across multiple shifts. Students alleged they were kept inside exam halls for hours with no clarity, triggering panic and protests. The exam did, eventually, happen in the second shift.Anshika, a commerce student hoping to pursue BCom from Delhi University, had left her home in Sector 134 early morning with her father. “I studied so hard for this that I couldn’t focus properly on my CBSE boards. Cuet was my main target — I spent the last two to three months in coaching, mock tests, back-to-back exams. My parents even postponed our family trip because the dates kept changing. Now it feels like it all went in vain,” she told TOI.Around 10am, students said officials “casually” informed them of “technical issues” — but gave no formal update and did not allow anyone to leave. Between 10.55am and 11.10am, candidates were finally asked to go home.In a statement, National Testing Agency (NTA) said 73,106 candidates had completed biometric registration for shift 1, of whom 69,341 were eventually able to appear after delays. It added that 3,765 candidates “could not wait until the examination resumed and left.”“I didn’t leave. I waited because I had no choice,” said a candidate, who was present outside the centre. “Every 10 minutes they said ‘just wait a little more’. How can students walk out when an exam deciding their future is at stake? And then NTA says we chose to leave — the entire burden is being put on us when the system is the one that failed.”Others echoed the frustration. “We still don’t know what happened or when the exam will be held again,” said another candidate, admit card still in hand, waiting outside the gates.The physical conditions inside added to the distress. Students alleged there were no functioning fans despite the heat. “Some hadn’t even eaten breakfast properly out of anxiety. I dropped my brother off at 6.30am and came back at 10am expecting it to be over — nobody had even appeared for the paper yet,” said Anuj, whose younger brother was among the candidates.Those who had travelled long distances bore the brunt. “I came from Dwarka — nearly two hours. We had no phones inside, no way to reach our parents. My mother waited outside in the heat the entire time. Is this a joke?” said another candidate.The chaos spilled into the second shift as well. Entry gates that were supposed to open at 1pm did not let students in until nearly 2.30pm. “It breaks my heart to see the mental agony students are being put through. An aspirant puts in months of work for this day — subjecting them to this level of administrative chaos right before they enter the hall is deeply unfair. NTA must issue an immediate clarification,” said Varun Goel, a faculty member at PhysicsWallah, who accompanied his students to the centre.
