New Delhi/Noida: The Common University Entrance Test (CUET) for admission to undergraduate courses was delayed across centres on Saturday after a technical glitch, the National Testing Agency (NTA) said, as it announced a retest for over 3,700 candidates, a bulk of whom appeared to be from a single hub in Noida.Students arrive at an examination centre to appear for the Common University Entrance Test (CUET-UG) 2026 at Sarita Vihar, in New Delhi on Saturday. (Hemant Rawat)NTA attributed the delay to an error in the systems run by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which conducts the exam.Saturday’s mess triggered fresh anxiety among thousands of students appearing for tests that would determine their admission to undergraduate courses, and is the latest in a raft of disruptions that have dogged India’s standardised examinations.The delay affected over 73,100 students in 533 examination centres spanning 306 cities, said the agency, as it fends off criticism over yet another of its standardised tests. The tests, for 12 subjects in Shift 1, were scheduled to start at 9am, but were delayed by two hours, as candidates sat inside examination rooms throughout, with little clarity.NTA said, “69,341 candidates (almost 95%) completed their examination at their respective centres.” However, it added that “3,765 candidates could not wait until the examination resumed and left their respective examination centres, without appearing for the test.”When asked, a senior NTA official denied the claims that students were asked to leave and said that “they were not told the exam was cancelled”.“Nobody at any centre announced that the exam was being cancelled. It seems all students who were scheduled to write the exam at that centre left without writing the exam,” said the official, who asked not to be named.In its statement announcing the retest, NTA said, “These 3,765 candidates belong to all 533 exam centres across the country where examination was held including at the Noida 64 exam centre.”The agency will reschedule the test for these students as a “one-time measure”, the agency said, adding that it had ordered TCS-iON, a unit of TCS, to analyse the causes of the delay and file a report.However, at the Noida Sector 64 centre referenced by the NTA, no student seems to have written the exam in the first shift, which was supposed to begin at 9am, parents and students said. Officials said the centre has the capacity to accommodate at least 4,000 students.HT spoke to dozens of students from the centre, who confirmed that they registered their biometrics and waited in the testing rooms for hours, before officials said the papers had been “postponed” and asked them to leave.“We entered the examination hall and were made to wait for four hours. Then we were informed that the exam had been postponed,” said Sayanshika (who goes by a single name), who was to appear for the English test.A parent at the centre confirmed this account.“My child’s exam was in the morning shift, and it didn’t happen. This is a major examination. They studied all night, then woke up at 5am. They are playing with children’s futures here,” said Navita, who declined to reveal her surname.CUET-UG, for admissions to undergraduate programmes in over 300 universities, is conducted in two shifts. Under the normal schedule, candidates for the morning shift need to complete their registration by 8.30am and the examination begins at 9am.Saturday’s mess is the latest setback to the NTA, and the latest in a series of missteps across mass examinations.NTA on May 12 cancelled the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG) and ordered a mass retest after central agencies confirmed that the question paper had been leaked, throwing the futures of hundreds of thousands of students into question and triggering disarray in college admission cycles. That leak sparked an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), a series of arrests and inquiries into the paper-setting process. The chaos also prompted the Supreme Court to intervene and censure the testing agency.Then, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) faced swirling criticism over its controversial on-screen marking system, as allegations emerged that the agency had made shortcuts in the tendering process and that it asked school principals to defend the process using a distributed “toolkit”.Students across centres in Delhi, Noida, Gurugram, Lucknow and other cities described confusion, long waits and inadequate communication.Aditi Azad, an 18-year-old who appeared for the English and fine arts papers at a Mathura Road centre, said candidates waited for hours after taking their seats.“My paper was scheduled from 9 am to 11 am, but it only began at 11:30 am. Initially, the invigilators asked us to remain calm and said the issue would be resolved within 10 to 15 minutes. But as time passed, it became clear that they themselves had little idea about what was causing the delay,” she said.Saurabh Singh, a student who appeared in the first shift in Gurugram, said, “It is disheartening and stressful for students to wait for the exams. It brings our morale down. If a student is late, then they are denied entry into the hall, but what about the faults on the authorities’ end.”Abhishek Kumar, who appeared for the exam in Faridabad, said, “I was here at 7.45am for the exam but had to wait till 11am. The energy level drops. We work hard to crack these exams and this is unfair.”Rudaksh Gupta, a candidate at Tirumala Education Academy in Lucknow, said they were allowed to enter the centre at 9am.“When we entered the exam centre we were informed that the servers were not working. This led to a wait of about two-and-half hours,” said Gupta.At the Noida centre, students claimed they weren’t allowed to leave their rooms for hours.“The ACs weren’t working, there was no drinking water, and we couldn’t communicate with our parents,” said Sayanshika.In a statement, K Krithivasan, CEO and managing director at TCS, said that “a brief technical issue” caused a delay of around two hours.“The issue was promptly identified and resolved by our technical teams and the examination has since resumed without any impact to the sanctity of the exam. We regret the inconvenience,” the company said in a statement.