MBBS admissions extended by a week to fill up vacant seats in deemed institutes

Admissions to undergraduate medical courses across the country have been extended by another week following a Supreme Court order dated February 5. The medical counselling committee (MCC) in a circular on February 8 announced that admissions to MBBS courses will now continue till February 11 to fill up remaining vacant seats.

As per information shared by MCC, there are a total of five seats vacant—one each across five All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), and admissions for these will be conducted by AIIMS, New Delhi. Similarly, another 37 seats are currently lying vacant across five deemed institutes under non-resident Indian (NRI) and management quotas. This includes 17 vacant seats under the NRI quota at Navi Mumbai’s DY Patil Medical College. The second offline stray vacant seat round will be conducted by the Directorate General of Health Sciences (DGHS).

Many have blamed seat vacancies in NRI and management quotas on the strain that a large number of families have felt financially due to Covid-19 and the eventual lockdown in 2020. As per the Fee Regulating Authority, higher education institutes can charge up to five times the regular fees of an open category seat for 15% seats reserved under the NRI and management quotas.

“Deemed as well as private medical and dental institutes charge as much as three to five times the regular fees for seats under management and NRI quotas, which many students might not be able to afford this year. This could be one of the biggest reasons for seats under these two quotas to go unclaimed this year,” said Dr T P Lahane, director, Directorate of Medical Education & Research (DMER).