india

Updated: Aug 28, 2019 00:14 IST

Seats allotted to the external affairs, home and defence ministries from the Centre’s pool of MBBS/BDS (Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery/ Bachelor of Dental Surgery) seats have gone up to 122 in the current academic session (2019-20) from 80 in the last session.

The Centre has a separate pool of MBBS/BDS seats, from which some are allotted to select states and Union territories (UTs), ministries and government departments that nominate their own candidates. The condition is that only candidates who have cleared the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) can be nominated.

Last year, the health ministry had allotted 173 seats to 11 states/UTs that did not have enough medical colleges. But with many states setting up new medical colleges or increasing the number of MBBS/BDS seats in existing ones this academic year, they require fewer seats from the central pool. As a result, the number of seats allotted to them has gone down.

“As a result of reduction (of seats) for the states, there has been a significant increase in the number of seats assigned to ministries such as home, defence and external affairs,” said a senior health ministry official, requesting anonymity.

States and UTs that were earlier allotted seats from the central pool were Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu and Lakshadweep.

“More medical colleges have been set up, making it easier for students to seek admission in their state,” the ministry official said.

The home ministry has got 30 seats against the earlier sanctioned strength of 22. The defence ministry’s quota has gone up from 20 to 38 seats, and the external affairs ministry will now get 54 seats against its earlier strength of 38.

“The beneficiary candidates, however, will be chosen only through NEET. Cracking the common entrance test is the primary selection criteria for allotment of colleges,” said the official.