NEET PG 2025 Counselling: 1140 Seats Still Vacant After Stray Round; Centre Rules Out Scrapping Exam

A total of 1,140 seats remained vacant after NEET PG 2025 stray round of counselling as per information shared by Union Government to Rajya Sabha. Despite state-level opposition, Centre confirmed there is no plan to scrap NEET exam for medical courses admission.

NEET PG Exam: Union Government of India has informed Rajya Sabha that 1,140 postgraduate (PG) medical seats are still remained vacant after conclusion of NEET PG 2025 stray vacancy round counselling. Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Anupriya Patel, shared that these vacant seats exists even after reducing NEET PG 2026 qualifying cutoff to 'negative' 

NEET PG Counselling 2025: Seat Vacancy Details 

According to data submitted on March 17, 2026, 1,140 vacant PG medical seats have been reported in government and private medical colleges across India. board has increased seat availability and approved 8,416 new postgraduate seats to facilitate students. Despite increasing PG medical seats to 58,331, more than 1000 seats are still vacant. As per experts, students lack interest in non-clinical branches like Physiology and Anatomy. Another reason is high tuition fees in private institutions. 

No Proposal to Scrap NEET

Union Government, while talking about future of examination, said that there is currently no proposal to discontinue NEET for medical education. This statement comes after resolutions passed by Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal for discontinuing NEET. These states want scrapping national-level test and want state-conducted entrance exams for medical education. government said that NEET is mandatory under Section 14 of National Medical Commission (NMC) Act, for equal, merit-based admission process.