Doctor who scored 9/800 in NEET entrance bags PG seat; plunging cut-offs spark outrage among medical bodies

CHENNAI: A doctor who scored 9 out of 800 marks in the NEET PG entrance examination was the last person to be allotted a postgraduate medical seat in a private medical college under the management quota for 2025-2026 by the state selection committee in the third round of counselling on Monday.

If 1,902 doctors allotted seats under the govt quota and 643 students allotted seats under the management quota do not take the seats they are allotted, the cut-offs are likely to drop further in the next round, officials said. Doctors associations including IMA and senior doctors said the admission is setting a wrong precedent in medical education.


Candidates who completed MBBS are admitted to PG medical courses based on merit in NEET PG. The 3.3 hours computer-based test features 200 multiple-choice questions, each worth 4 marks, with negative marking of -1 for incorrect answers. Earlier, National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences lowered NEET PG qualifying cut-off for the 2025-26 academic session, reducing marks to 103 out of 800. For SC, ST and OBC candidates, qualifying score was -40 out of 800.

The move, aimed at filling over 9,000 vacant PG seats, triggered backlash after the Centre's medical counselling committee allotted seats to doctors with negative scores under the all India quota in govt medical colleges and in deemed universities. On Monday, the state selection committee released results for third round of counselling for admissions to govt medical colleges and self-financing colleges. Under govt quota, a student with 42 marks secured admission in MD community medicine at Sri Muthukumaran Medical College, Chennai, while a student with 71 secured MD forensic medicine at Srinivasan Medical College and Hospital, Samayapuram.

Under service quota—seats reserved for doctors in govt hospitals—the cut-off was 87 marks for MS orthopaedics in ESI Medical College, Chennai. There were seven students with scores below 100 allotted PG seats.

The cut-off dropped further for management quota. While the lowest was 9 marks for MD pharmacology at Dhanalakshmi Srinivasan medical college, Perambalur, a candidate with 25 marks bagged a seat in MD community medicine at the same college. At least 21 doctors who scored below 100 were allotted PG seats.