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By:

Rajendra Joshi

3 December 2024 at 3:50:26 am

Vacancies, Not Merit, Driving PG Admissions Policy

Anger over relaxed admission norms sparks nationwide backlash; the deeper structural failures demand scrutiny. A large number of vacant seats in the third round of counselling for postgraduate medical admissions has pushed policymakers into a controversial corner. In a bid to fill these seats, the Medical Counselling Committee’s decision to sharply lower cut-offs has triggered widespread criticism from across the medical fraternity. The National Medical Commission (NMC) has publicly expressed...

Vacancies, Not Merit, Driving PG Admissions Policy

Anger over relaxed admission norms sparks nationwide backlash; the deeper structural failures demand scrutiny. A large number of vacant seats in the third round of counselling for postgraduate medical admissions has pushed policymakers into a controversial corner. In a bid to fill these seats, the Medical Counselling Committee’s decision to sharply lower cut-offs has triggered widespread criticism from across the medical fraternity. The National Medical Commission (NMC) has publicly expressed its disapproval, professional associations of doctors have warned of serious consequences for patient care, and the matter has now reached the Supreme Court. Against this backdrop, a fundamental question confronts the Union government: will it prioritise the quality of medical education or dilute standards merely to fill vacant seats? For the 2025–26 academic year, India has 80,291 postgraduate medical seats. Of the 31,215 seats available in the third round of counselling, as many as 17,623 remained vacant. In addition, 11,837 ‘virtual’ seats created due to upgradation also went unfilled, even after 135 new seats were added. Traditionally, postgraduate medical admissions have been intensely competitive. This year’s unprecedented vacancies, however, prompted the Medical Counselling Committee to relax eligibility norms for the third round. As a result, the cut-off for the general category has been lowered from the 50th percentile to the 7th percentile, while for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes it has been reduced to zero percentile — effectively allowing candidates with minus 40 marks to qualify. Given that the NEET-PG examination follows a negative marking system, even candidates with negative scores out of 800 can now become eligible for admission. This decision is as startling as it is risky. Allowing candidates who have effectively failed the examination to enter postgraduate medical programmes raises serious concerns about academic standards and, more critically, about the quality of future patient care. Medical professionals across the country have flagged precisely this issue. The government must now decide whether it wishes to produce merely degree-holding doctors or invest in building a healthcare system strengthened by rigorously trained specialists. The controversy also demands a more uncomfortable introspection: why did the system reach a point where such drastic dilution of cut-offs appeared necessary? The answer lies less with the students and more with structural deficiencies in medical education. In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic and the acute shortage of medical manpower it exposed, the Union government accelerated the expansion of medAical seats across the country. However, this expansion has not been matched by a commensurate investment in faculty strength and infrastructure Maharashtra, often considered among the better-performing states, offers a telling example. Of its 25 government medical colleges, 10 have less than 50 per cent of the required teaching staff. At the newly established Ratnagiri Government Medical College, faculty availability stands at just 11.76 per cent of NMC norms, with not a single department having a professor. According to a report by the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, not a single new teacher has been appointed across 25 medical colleges. The NMC has also issued show-cause notices to several states, including Tamil Nadu, over inadequate faculty strength. Such shortages inevitably place an excessive burden on existing faculty, directly affecting the quality of training. If this is the condition at the undergraduate level, it is hardly surprising that students struggle to meet minimum benchmarks in postgraduate entrance examinations. When the source itself is depleted, the outcome is bound to reflect that deficit. Seen in this light, vacant postgraduate seats are not an aberration but a symptom of deeper systemic neglect — and a warning about how much quality has already been compromised in undergraduate medical education. The issue is now under judicial scrutiny, with a public interest litigation challenging the relaxation of NEET-PG cut-offs. The petition argues that the very purpose of the exam — introduced to curb donation-based admissions and ensure merit-driven selection — has been undermined. Medical associations have echoed this concern, warning that short-term administrative fixes could have long-term consequences for healthcare delivery. At stake is more than the fate of a single admission cycle. The government’s response will signal whether India intends to protect the integrity of postgraduate medical education and strengthen its healthcare workforce, or whether it is willing to trade standards for numbers. The future credibility of Indian medical education may well hinge on that choice. (The writer is a senior journalist based in Kolhapur. Views personal.)

Clever seat selection helped BJP to secure historic win

The party won 65 seats against Congress, 37 against NCP (SP) and 29 against Shiv Sena (UBT)

Clever seat selection

Mumbai: The BJP’s strategic seat sharing with the allies has proved beneficial for the party. An analysis of the Assembly election results show that the BJP has scored over its main rival, the Congress, in a big way because of the direct fights.


The analysis shows that BJP defeated all three constituents of the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) – Congress, Shiv Sena (UBT) and NCP (SP) – in the direct fights. This is attributed as one of the reasons for the BJP’s historic poll success.


The BJP contested 147 out of 288 seats. In 76 constituencies, it faced Congress. BJP secured victory in 65 seats and lost only 11 seats, making it a whopping 86 per cent of the total direct fights. This was followed by an even stronger performance against NCP (SP). Of the total 39 fights with Sharad Pawar’s party, BJP captured 37 seats making it 95 per cent of the total fights with NCP (SP). BJP and Shiv Sena (UBT) were head-to-head in 32 constituencies, of which BJP emerged victorious in 29 seats, making this 91 per cent of the total direct contests.


According to a BJP strategist the party had bargained hard with its allies, Shiv Sena and NCP to get the desired constituencies in the seat sharing formula. “We had studied to potential candidates of the MVA. That helped us in choosing the seats where we can register comfortable victories,” the strategist said.


BJP spokesperson Niranjan Shetty attributed the success to all the party workers who worked hard to boost development, infrastructure in the state. He gave credit to Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis for his contribution to the party’s success.


Shetty pointed out that in 2019, Uddhav Thackeray had stalled all the “novel” and “legendary” projects that Fadnavis had started when he had taken over as CM, making it very easy for the people of Maharashtra to strike a comparison between both the leaders and the potential they had for serving the people. “Devendra Fadnavis gave up his post very easily for the larger good. There are many such examples like Venkaiah Naidu who was BJP National President and later worked as the Vice President of India because that was the need of the hour. We seldom care about our posts,” Shetty told The Perfect Voice.


Congress spokesperson Atul Londhe refused to call the election results as the people’s mandate. “This is not at all a Janata mandate. Despite Maharashtra struggling with so many basic social issues, how can BJP acquire such a huge mandate is the question. If a student copies and fails with just passing marks, it can go unnoticed, but if a student copies and bags the number one position, something is fishy. Why is the BJP scared of ballot papers?” he said.

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