NEET PG 2025 Vacant Seats: 1140 Seats Left Despite Lowering Cutoff

NEET PG 2025: 1140 Seats Still Vacant After Stray Round

The Union Government has informed the upper house of Parliament that 1140 postgraduate medical seats remained unoccupied in the academic year 2025. According to the data shared by the Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, Anupriya Patel, the considerable number of NEET PG seats have remained vacant across the government and private medical colleges after the stray vacancy round counselling. The NEET PG medical seats remained unfulfilled despite authorities having reduced the qualifying percentile of all categories. As per the revised NEET PG cut off 2025, the qualifying percentile for General category was reduced to 7th percentile with 103 cut off marks, 5th percentile for For General PwD candidates with 90 marks and 0 percentile with -40 cut off marks for SC, ST and OBC categories.

NEET PG Counselling 2025: Seat Increase and Vacancy Details

The Union Government increased the number of NEET PG seats in India. A total of 8416 postgraduate medical seats were included in the year 2025. With the sudden increase of around 8416 NEET PG seats in a single year, the data showed the current approval doubled the previous year's addition of seats. Previously, the expansion of PG medical seats has not crossed this number.

The number of vacant seats in NEET PG counselling 2025 have shown a significant growth. Earlier, the highest number of vacant seats stood at 4400 in 2022-23. Last year, a total of 2849 NEET PG seats remained vacant across government and private medical colleges in the country. In the below table, we have provided the figures of NEET PG seat expansion and vacant details over the last 5 years.

Expansion & Vacant NEET PG Seats in India Over Last 5 Years

(The data was shared by Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare in Rajya Sabha during the Budget session of Parliament in February 2026)

Will NEET PG Special Stray Round Counselling be Conducted?

It is expected that MCC will conduct the NEET PG special stray round counselling to fill the vacant seats. As of now, there is no announcement on whether NEET PG counselling 2025 for special stray rounds will be conducted or not. However, with the significant number of vacant seats available for MD, MS and PG Diploma courses, eligible candidates will get a chance to secure their seat in the special stray vacancy round.

Possible Reasons For Vacant NEET PG Seats in India

The NEET PG seats vacancy after stray round counseling of nEET PG 2025 has created major challenges in the postgraduate medical education in India. Despite reduction in NEET PG qualifying percentile, there are around 1140 NEET PG seats still vacant for candidates. There are major challenges and serious reasons behind the vacant NEET PG seats:

High tuition fees in medical colleges: The major concern is the high tuition fees in private and deemed medical colleges. Clinical specialties like dermatology and radiodiagnosis are expensive and colleges charge exorbitant fee amounts from the candidates.

Medical colleges with erratic stipends: Most of the colleges provide less amount of stipend to the medical graduates. Candidates could not bear the expenses with a low amount of stipend which resulted in the vacancy of seats in the postgraduate medical colleges.

Lack of interest in non-clinical specialities: Experts believe that students have low interest in non-clinical specialities like physiology, microbiology, anatomy and others. Candidates who will be allotted non-clinical branches in the NEET PG counselling allotment failed to join the allotted college and thus leads to vacancy of seats

Excessive workload and unsafe environment: NEET PG seats remain vacant due to excessive workload and unsafe training conditions present in the remote regions. Doctors avoid taking admission in colleges with heavy workload and weak infrastructure.