TN & Pondy account for 93% of vacant MBBS seats; 97% in self-financed quota ‘Colleges Must Reduce Fees To Fill Vacancies’

TN & Pondy account for 93% of vacant MBBS seats; 97% in self-financed quota ‘Colleges Must Reduce Fees To Fill Vacancies’

Anuja.Jaiswal@timesofindia.com  04.11.2026

New Delhi: Tamil Nadu and Puducherry account for nearly 93% of the 946 MBBS seats listed in the special stray vacancy round of NEET-UG counselling 2026. The state and Union territory together have 875 vacancies, with Tamil Nadu accounting for 688 and Puducherry, 187. 

Of the 946 vacancies, 920 (over 97%) are under the self-financed merit seat quota, with just 26 falling under other categories, including all India, open seat, Delhi University and nonresident Indian quotas. 

Karnataka has 25 vacancies and Maharashtra, 13; followed by Telangana, 5; Gujarat, 4; Bihar, Uttarakhand and West Bengal (3 each), and five other states with two vacancies each. 

Goa, Haryana, Keralam, Meghalaya and Sikkim have one vacancy each. 

A senior official in health ministry told TOI that high fees were the main reason for the vacancies, with students from north India also reluctant to travel to the South because of language and cultural differences. “The South has a longer history of medical education and more established medical colleges, while many institutions in the North have come up in recent years.

With the number of seats rising, particularly in private colleges, and govt options also expanding, students are increasingly unwilling to take up expensive private seats. Colleges are now offering fee concessions, in some cases of 40-50%. Rather than lowering MBBS qualifying percentile, colleges should reduce fees to fill vacant seats,” the official said. 

The official also recalled an earlier advisory asking private medical colleges to charge govt rates for 50% of their seats but said it could not be implemented as the matter went to court. Just a few colleges account for a large share of the vacancies. 

Tamil Nadu’s Shri Sathya Sai Medical College has 188 seats, followed by Meenakshi Medical College with 117. In Puducherry, Mahatma Gandhi Medical College has 95 and Sri Lakshmi Narayana Institute of Medical Sciences 88, while Tamil Nadu’s Sree Balaji Medical College has 82 vacancies.  

The fifth round of BDS counselling has 207 vacancies, led by Maharashtra, 54; Karnataka, 27, and Tamil Nadu, 25. Of these, 112 are under the all India quota and 71 under the NRI quota, while 11 are self-financed merit seats. The official attributed the vacancies to limited job prospects and a rapid expansion of dental colleges. 

Many students view BDS as a basic degree and opt for an MBA or hospital management course instead, the official said, adding that some colleges struggle to fill even half their seats. The BDS qualifying percentile was lowered once around three to four years ago, but no similar relaxation has been made for MBBS. 

The matrix also lists 66 BSc Nursing vacancies, including 38 in Delhi, 17 in Karnataka and 11 in Uttar Pradesh. This takes the total number of vacancies across MBBS, BDS and BSc Nursing courses to 1,219.