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Govt to reduce percentile for admission via NEET by 15%

New Delhi: Worried over vacant seats in postgraduate courses in medical colleges, the government on Friday decided to reduce the percentile for admission into various PG courses through the National Eligibility and Entrance Test (NEET) by 15 percent.
Given that there is an acute shortage of specialist doctors in the country, the move may help in addressing the crunch of medical practitioners. The decision would be effective for PG and Super Speciality (SS) courses.
The decision is likely to benefit about 18,000 students as this will improve the chances of filling up PG seats and minimising wastage of seats.
While commenting on the decision, Union Health Minister JP Nadda said, "All efforts are being made to fill up the PG seats. This is a significant step towards strengthening the medical sector and indicates the priority given by the government to the health sector."
"We are making sure that there is adequate manpower for providing quality health services," Nadda added.
Explaining the decision, a senior official in Health Ministry said, "The reduction in percentile by 15 percent means MBBS graduates of general category would now have to score minimum 35th percentile instead of 50th percentile for getting a PG seat, while the minimum percentile for medical graduates of SC/ST/OBC categories would be now 25th percentile instead of 40th percentile."
The senior official further said that the decision would also benefit PG students appearing in NEET under Persons with Disabilities (PWD) category as now they would a PG seat on 30th percentile score."
Earlier, the government had lowered the qualifying NEET score for admission to postgraduate medical courses by 7.5 percentile in June 2017. The Centre along with Dental Council of India had on May 17 issued a similar order lowering qualifying NEET score for admission in PG dental by 7.5 percentile.
"Since a large number of seats have remained vacant in PG and Super Speciality (SS) courses, the Medical Council of India (MCI) supported the government move in lowering the percentile. It would help students in getting admission in PG courses," a senior MCI official said.
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