Amid the ongoing protests following the NEET-UG paper leak controversy, the National Testing Agency (NTA) has terminated 47 officials and is set to initiate legal and criminal action against some of them. It has also notified fresh recruitments to strengthen the agency.The move comes a day after Higher Education Secretary Vineet Joshi was shunted out to the Panchayati Raj Ministry.“The NTA is set to undergo an overhaul and more reformative measures will follow. At least 47 officials have been terminated, and legal and criminal action will be initiated against some of them,” a senior official said.Outrage surrounding paper leaks and the CBSE digital evaluation glitches has triggered a series of shunting of top officials. Students’ anger has spilt out in the form of a huge protest that is taking place at Jantar Mantar, besides other places across the country.The NTA, an autonomous body under the Union Education Ministry, has this week issued advertisements for senior professional appointments at the level of general manager and has separately opened the engagement of 16 young professionals through the Union Public Service Commission’s Pratibha Setu portal.The testing agency has also notified four general manager posts on contract, each for an initial term of three years. The general manager (assessment research and development and psychometrics) will head the NTA’s academic and measurement science functions, with responsibility for item banks, normalisation methodology, equating and calibration procedures, and pilots on computer-adaptive testing and AI-assisted assessment.“The general manager, test centre network and operations, will lead NTA’s nationwide test-centre footprint, spanning over 500 cities and select international centres, with responsibility for empanelment standards, capacity planning, centre quality, accessibility for candidates with benchmark disabilities, hygiene and amenities, examination-day operations, and coordination with state and district administrations,” the Education Ministry said.The general manager (information security), designated as the NTA’s chief information security officer, will head the agency’s cyber security function and be responsible for the security of all NTA systems, applications, networks and data.The general manager (vigilance, investigation and forensics) will head the NTA’s internal vigilance, investigations and digital forensics functions.“Responsibilities include leading enquiries into suspected malpractice, building an in-house digital forensics capability, and coordinating with the CBI, the Intelligence Bureau, the Enforcement Directorate, state police and cybercrime units on cases arising under the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024,” the ministry said.The NTA recently informed Parliament that it was functioning with only 24 permanent employees against a sanctioned strength of 39 posts. Since its inception in 2018, the agency has conducted over 270 examinations covering more than 6.6 crore candidate registrations.