Centre Denies Scraping NEET; 1140 NEET PG Seats Still Vacant After Stray Round

The Union Government has informed the Rajya Sabha that a total of 1,140 postgraduate (PG) medical seats remained vacant across government and private medical colleges after the first round of the National Eligibility and Entrance Test-Postgraduate (NEET-PG) counselling 2025.

The Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Anupriya Patel, said in a response to a question raised by MP Rajathi on March 17, 2026.

On question about the discontinuation of the NEET exam, the government clarified that there is no proposal to discontinue NEET.

As per section 14 of the National Medical Commission (NMC) Act, 2019 NEET is mandated as a uniform entrance test for admission to medical courses across the country.

Notably, to reduce the issue of vacant seats, the government reduced the qualifying percentile for NEET PG 2025 counselling. Therefore, the revised eligibility criteria for the Unreserved Category were reduced to above the 7th percentile; above the 5th percentile for the UR-PwD category and above the 5th percentile, and all candidates in the SC/ST/OBC categories were declared qualified.

The Medical Counselling Committee (MCC) under the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) conducts counselling for 50% All India Quota (AIQ) seats and 100% seats of Central and Deemed Universities.