New Delhi: Defending its decision to slash the qualifying percentile for NEET-PG 2025 counselling, the National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS) told the Supreme Court Monday the revision did not compromise merit since admissions were based on rank and selected candidates still have to complete their course to obtain a degree or diploma.
The board, which filed an affidavit before the court, said 95,913 additional candidates had become eligible to participate in NEET-PG 2025 counselling after the cut-off was lowered — raising the total pool from 1,28,116 to 2,24,029.
It warned that any order by the court to reverse the board’s decision would prejudice these candidates, who were not parties to the case.
“It will be in public interest to have all the vacant seats duly filled up to enable the candidates to specialise and make them more skilled in the chosen area of specialisation,” NBEMS said in its affidavit. NBEMS is the government body that organises pan-India medical entrance exams.
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The exam & the results
The 2025 NEET-PG exam, held for post-graduate medical and dental admissions, was conducted on 3 August last year. Around 2.42 lakh students appeared for the exam, with around 52,000 PG medical seats up for grabs across the country. The results, declared on 19 August, saw 1.28 lakh candidates qualify for counselling rounds.
Months later, on 13 January, NBEMS issued a notification drastically reducing the qualifying cut-off percentile for NEET-PG counselling to fill thousands of vacant postgraduate seats across government and private medical colleges.
Under the revised criteria, the qualifying percentile for reserved categories was reduced from 40 to zero; for the general category, from the 50th to the 7th percentile; and for persons with disabilities in the general category, from the 45th to the 5th percentile.
In practical terms, reports said, this meant that candidates scoring as low as minus 40 out of 800 became eligible under reserved categories, while a score of 103 out of 800 sufficed for a general category candidate, and 90 out of 800 for a general category candidate with benchmark disability.
The revision drew sharp public scrutiny when it emerged that candidates with strikingly low scores had secured postgraduate seats.
In Rohtak, for example, a government medical college allotted an MS Orthopaedics seat to a candidate who scored 4 out of 800. At Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences in Telangana, 20 candidates with scores ranging from 1 to 99 were admitted to postgraduate medical courses.
In the court
The matter reached the court when the United Doctors Front (UDF), social worker Harisharan Devgan, and others filed a public interest litigation challenging the NBEMS’ reduction in eligibility criteria.
A bench of Justices P.S. Narasimha and Alok Aradhe, taking up the petition, had observed that the challenge was “about standards”.
“The question is whether those standards are being compromised,” the bench had said, directing the Centre to file a detailed affidavit explaining the rationale behind the decision.
Petitioners argued that the revision undermined merit and posed a threat to public health.
Satyam Singh Rajput, counsel for the petitioners, said: “The arbitrary award of compensatory marks to the candidates fundamentally undermines merit-based selection and violates Article 14’s equality guarantee.”
He added: “This manipulation, allegedly orchestrated by the private medical college players, prioritises commercial interests over merit and competence. Such irregularities directly threaten India’s healthcare system by potentially placing less qualified practitioners in critical medical positions, compromising patient care quality nationwide.”
The Supreme Court will take up the case next on 23 February.
Government’s stand
Speaking in Parliament earlier this month, Union Minister of State for Health Anupriya Patel said the qualifying percentile was reduced “to ensure that the precious PG medical seats do not remain vacant”. Patel added that similar steps had been taken in previous academic years to maximise seat utilisation.
A senior National Medical Commission (NMC) official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said broader reforms of the NEET-PG system were being planned to ensure greater clarity, stability, and predictability in the admissions process.
“After two rounds of NEET-PG Counselling (in 2025), 18,000 PG seats remained vacant (before, out of which over 5,000 are government merit seats. This proves that this reform is not for private colleges, as falsely projected. If government seats are lying vacant, the problem is systemic — not commercial,” the official said, referring to the multiple rounds of counselling that are held for final admissions.
“A national examination that leaves one-third of its training capacity unused is irrational,” the official added.
NMC is the body that sets policies for medical education in India, and determines NEET guidelines.
(Edited by Prerna Madan)
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When marks are a measure of merit in an exam , how is lowering it not going to compromise with merit ? Does the government believe marks are just for fun ? Govt is merely interested in filling up seats and lower marks will ensure less meritorious students fill up those seats which usually lie vacant. And this is how “good” and “bad” branches or streams are developed over a period of time. Else , excellence has no branch or stream. But indulging in such shenanigans definitely results in one.