Kashmir Impulse Desk

Srinagar, July 16

Two students from Jammu and Kashmir secured places in the National Testing Agency’s (NTA) list of state toppers after the results of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate) 2026 were announced on Thursday.

Hadiya Nisar emerged as the highest-ranked candidate from the union territory, securing an All India Rank (AIR) of 99 with a percentile score of 99.9931.

Zaidan Wani followed with AIR 124 and the same percentile score.

They were the only candidates from Jammu and Kashmir to feature in the NTA’s state-wise toppers’ list.

The NTA said more than 1.12 million candidates qualified in the examination, making them eligible for admission to undergraduate medical, dental, AYUSH and other allied health courses.

Nearly 2 million candidates appeared for the entrance test, which was conducted on June 21 at 5440 centres across 551 cities in India and 14 cities overseas.

The agency said scorecards had been uploaded to its official website, while category-wise cut-offs, state-wise toppers and other merit lists were also released to facilitate the admission and counselling process.

A total of 138 candidates scored above 690 marks out of 720, including 19 candidates who crossed the 700-mark. Aryan Gupta of Punjab and Panshul Bansal of Haryana jointly topped the examination with 715 marks.

Women accounted for more than 58 percent of all successful candidates, recording a higher qualification rate than men, according to the NTA.

Among those who qualified, candidates from the Other Backward Classes (Non-Creamy Layer) category formed the largest group, followed by those in the General, Scheduled Caste, General-EWS and Scheduled Tribe categories.