NEET UG Counselling dates

The result for NEET UG 2013 (National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test - Under Graduate) exam – conducted by CBSE – was announced on June 5, 2013 but the counselling dates for the same are still awaited. The exam was conducted across 85 cities in India on May 5, 2013, except for Karnataka, where the exam was conducted on May 18, 2013 due to state elections.

The counselling dates are expected to be announced on several sites including Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Medical Education Directorates of States, Armed Forces Medical College and relevant institutions and universities.

According to information received, the State-level counselling for undergraduate medical and dental admission in Bhubaneswar would take at least one more month to begin. The state government recently declared that it would wait for the national-level counselling by Directorate General of Health Services (DHGS), which is likely to happen around July 10, before going ahead with its own. DGHS will hold the counselling for the 15% all-India quota in state medical colleges, besides the central government-run institutions from the national merit list of NEET-UG 2013.

Subsequently, authorities conducting Odisha Joint Entrance Examination (OJEE) will hold the counselling from the state merit list of NEET-UG 2013 for filling up 85% seats in three government medical colleges, two private medical colleges, and three dental colleges.

Sitaram Mohapatra, State nodal officer for NEET-UG stated " We will wait for the national level dates. Because if some students from Odisha find seats in the national quota, overall number of candidates taking admission from Odisha will be more" . On the other hand, OJEE secretary Priyabrata Sahoo said “OJEE will work out the seat matrix for various categories of students after it receives data of state-level merit list from the CBSE. If DGHS undertakes the counseling by July 10, the state-level counseling would start a few days later," he said. There is no reason to worry as the medical counselling doesn't take a long time, unlike the engineering counselling. We will complete the medical counselling before July-end" reported a national daily.

The OJEE process is supposedly going slow due to the lack of clarity on the number of total MBBS seats in the most sought-after SCB Medical College and Hospital, Cuttack. Following the same, the state government has requested the Medical Council of India (MCI) to increase its seats from 150 to 250 this year.

Same is the case with Bangalore where the CET medical and dental seat allotment is likely to be delayed this year as the state government is awaiting for Supreme Court’s final verdict regarding the petitions that have challenged the Medical Council of India's decision to hold NEET-UG for admission to professional courses.

Due to the delay in SC's verdict, Karnataka Examination Authority (KEA) will have to start the seat allotment process only in the first week of July. The KEA will complete the three week long document verification process on June 23.