Rajasthan's Mahesh Kumar tops NEET-UG, MP's Utkarsh Awadhiya bags second rank

New Delhi: Rajasthan’s Mahesh Kumar has topped the medical entrance exam NEET-UG, while Utkarsh Awadhiya from Madhya Pradesh has bagged the second rank, the National Testing Agency (NTA) announced on Saturday.

More than 12.36 lakh candidates out of 22.09 lakh test takers qualified the exam. The number is down from last year’s 13.15 lakh qualifying candidates. However, the number of test takers was also higher last year at over 23.33 lakh.

Among the qualifying candidates this year, over 7.2 lakh are females while over 5.14 lakh are males.

While 529 qualifying candidates are foreign nationals, 405 are NRIs and 606 are OCI card holders.

Maharashtra’s Krishang Joshi and Delhi’s Mrinal Kishore Jha bagged the third and fourth ranks, respectively.

Among females, Delhi’s Avika Aggarwal emerged topper, bagging the fifth rank nationally.

The maximum qualifying candidates are from Uttar Pradesh (over 1.70 lakh), followed by Maharashtra (over 1.25 lakh) and Rajasthan (over 1.19 lakh). A total of 73 candidates have scored marks in the range of 651 to 686 out of 720 while 1,259 candidates have scored between 601 to 650. “The NTA conducts the exam and declares results based on the eligibility criteria provided by the National Medical Council (NMC). The admission authorities will now draw a merit list based on all India rank for the MBBS and BDS seats available in their jurisdiction,” said Col B Vijay Kumar, Director (Exams), NTA.

The National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test-Undergraduate (NEET-UG) is the largest entrance exam in the country in terms of the number of candidates appearing for the test. The NTA conducts the NEET every year for admission into medical colleges. A total of 1,08,000 seats are available for the MBSS course -- approximately 56,000 in government hospitals, and about 52,000 in private colleges.

Admissions to undergraduate courses in dentistry, Ayurveda, Unani and Siddha also utilise NEET results for admission.

NTA conducted NEET at 5,468 centres located at 552 cities in India and 14 cities in other countries on May 4. The cities outside India were Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Bangkok, Colombo, Doha, Kathmandu, Kuwait, Lagos, Kaula Lumpur, Manama, Muscat, Riyadh, Sharjah and Singapore.

The exam was conducted in 13 languages -- Assamese, Bengali, English, Urdu, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malyalam, Marathi, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu and Odia. Over 18 lakh candidates had opted to appear for the exam in English while over 2.28 lakh candidates appeared in Hindi. A total of 73 candidates have scored marks in the range of 651 to 686 out of 720 while 1,259 candidates have scored between 601 to 650.

The NTA had earlier this year announced that the crucial exam will continue to be conducted in pen and paper mode. The decision came after detailed deliberations between education and health ministries on whether to conduct the NEET-UG in pen and paper mode or online mode. In the line of fire over alleged irregularities in NEET and PhD entrance NET, the Centre had in July last year set up a panel to ensure transparent, smooth and fair conduct of examinations by NTA.

According to the high-level panel headed by former ISRO Chief R Radhakrishnan, multi-stage testing for NEET-UG could be a viable possibility that needs to be followed up. While NEET was last year plagued by several allegations of irregularities, including paper leaks, and litigation, UGC-NET was cancelled as the ministry received inputs that the integrity of the exam had been compromised. Both matters are being probed by the CBI.