Bombay HC allows medical colleges to hold institute-level round to fill vacant MBBS, BDS seats
Bombay High Court
Mumbai: Extending last year's interim order to the current year admission process as well, the Bombay High Court has recently allowed the Maharashtra Government authorities to have an institute-level counselling round to fill the vacant state-quota MBBS and BDS seats in private medical colleges.
The centralized National Eligibility-Entrance Test counselling in Maharashtra is managed by the Common Entrance Test Cell, also known as the Maha CET Cell.
Through the institute-level counselling, individual private medical colleges get to admit candidates to the vacant seats on their own, which is not allowed under the centralised counselling, where a central university allots seats across institutes.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that to put an end to the issue of seat blocking in medical colleges, NMC back in 2023 had out an end to the institute-level counselling, while clarifying that the counselling agencies in the State and the Centre would fill up the seats in all the medical institutes through online counselling. Back then, the NMC PG Board had mentioned that no college/institute should conduct the counselling, including the stray vacancy round, in physical mode.
Recently, Vedantaa Institute of Medical Sciences (VIMS), Palghar, moved the Bombay High Court seeking an institute-level round of admissions, where medical colleges fill vacant MBBS seats on their own instead of centralised NEET counselling for the state quota seats.
As per the latest media report by Careers 360, now the Division bench of the Bombay High Court, comprising justices Ravindra Ghuge and Ashwin Bhobe, has allowed the private medical colleges to fill up the vacant MBBS and BDS seats at the end of the NEET UG counselling 2025 process. The HC bench extended last year's intetim order granted in this regard. Last year also, the HC's verdict had come in response to a plea by VIMS Palghar.
The Daily has reported that around 451 out of 3,599 seats at private medical colleges are still vacant, whereas only 37 out of 4,936 state quota government seats are unfilled. In the case of VIMS Palghar, 96 out of 150 seats are yet to be filled.
Approaching the HC bench, the medical college challenged the NMC's July 2023 directive regarding the entire NEET UG counselling being conducted online and barring college-level counselling.
The petitioner college argued that the State's 2016 rules, which provide for the colleges to fill the seats left unclaimed after the centralised admission process (CAP) rounds, supersede the medical education regulator’s instructions.
However, the petition will continue, and the Court has asked NMC to submit its reply by December 20. The final hearing of the matter has been listed for further hearing on January 8, when the admission process is likely to be over.
Commenting on the matter, Ganesh Gole, NMC's lawyer, told Careers 360, "The previous plea hasn’t been resolved yet. The issue needs to be taken to its logical conclusion."
While the bench has extended the interim order from last year, it did not make any pronouncement on VIMS' plea to let candidates from outside the State also apply and secure admission in the state quota seats. "We didn’t push for this prayer during Tuesday’s hearing," said a counsel for the medical college, Madhav Thorat.
Another plea by VIMS against the state limiting the benefits of non-resident Indian (NRI) quota seats to only actual NRIs and their children is also pending and slated to be heard on Friday.
Also Read: Private medical college moves Bombay HC seeking institute-level admissions: Report
