The National Human Rights Commission on Tuesday issued notices to the Central Board of Secondary Education and the Tamil Nadu government, asking why students from the state had to travel to other states to take the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test on May 6.

The commission said that if media reports of students travelling to other states were true, it was a “serious violation of human rights”. “The students pass through tremendous pressures due to examinations. It is the duty of the state to ensure that they should not be subjected to any kind of discomfort,” the panel said. “It seems the state government and the CBSE authorities have failed to provide examination centres to the aspirants within the state, causing hardships for both students and parents.”

The NHRC added that the state government and the CBSE must explain what measures they were taking to ensure that such difficulties do not recur.

The exam – for admission to MBBS and BDS courses in colleges approved by the Medical Council of India or Dental Council of India – was held at 2,255 centres in 136 cities across the country. The results will be declared by June 5.

Before the exam, the Supreme Court’s stay on the Madras High Court’s directive to the CBSE to set up additional exam centres in Tamil Nadu had caused outrage in the state. Around 5,000 students from Tamil Nadu had been allocated centres in Kerala, Karnataka and Rajasthan.

The Union Human Resource Development Ministry had clarified a day before the exam that the students had been given centres outside the state because there was a “remarkable rise” in the number of candidates in Tamil Nadu.