Thousands of doctors across India are facing unemployment due to the indefinite delay in the NEET PG 2025 counselling for All India Quota seats. This delay, occurring months after the entrance test, has sparked outrage among candidates who accuse the National Medical Commission (NMC), the National Board of Examinations (NBE), and the Medical Counselling Committee (MCC) of mismanagement.
The MCC, under the Directorate General of Health Services, announced on November 6, 2025, just hours before the application deadline, that the choice-filling process for Round 1 of PG counselling would be extended until further notice. The reason cited was a revision of the seat matrix due to the NMC adding more PG seats and the NBE withdrawing 169 PG DNB seats after counselling had already commenced.
This eleventh-hour change has left nearly 1.28 lakh qualified candidates in a state of uncertainty. Many aspirants had quit their jobs to prepare for the PG entrance exam, while some even enrolled in year-long courses. The delay has not only jeopardized their career plans but has also resulted in financial and emotional distress. As one aspirant, Dr. S Sathish Kumar, stated, "They had a whole year to give colleges permission to start new courses or add seats. Why would they do this at the last minute? We got results on Aug 19 and have been waiting for admission".
The postponement of NEET PG counselling has severe repercussions for the healthcare system. With postgraduate students forming a significant part of the workforce in hospitals, including state-run medical colleges, the delay has led to staff shortages. Resident doctors are now overburdened, working nearly twice as much to compensate for the absence of incoming junior doctors. This excessive workload is causing exhaustion and burnout, raising concerns about the quality of patient care. As a third-year surgical resident in Mumbai pointed out, the delays impact not just students but also the healthcare system, leading to a shortage of trained specialists and ultimately affecting patients.
The Federation of Resident Doctors' Association India (FORDA) has urged the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare to intervene and expedite the admission process, emphasizing the impact of the delay on hospitals due to the shortage of resident doctors. FORDA also requested the NMC and MCC to immediately release the final NEET PG seat matrix 2025 along with the round 1 counselling schedule for both AIQ and state quota seats.
The ongoing situation has also disrupted the academic calendar, pushing PG courses that should ideally begin in May or June further back, affecting clinical training schedules and research work. This creates a perpetual cycle of delays, causing further disruption in medical education.
To mitigate the impact of the delayed counselling process, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has directed all central postgraduate institutes of medical education and research to extend the tenure of PG residents from the outgoing batch of 2022-25 until the new batch joins. This decision aims to reduce the workload on existing batches and ensure that patient care and departmental work do not suffer.
The NEET PG counselling delays have become a recurring issue, with a consistent pattern of delays observed between 2019 and 2025. These delays are attributed to various factors, including legal challenges, administrative inefficiencies, and court interventions over quota and transparency issues. Experts have called for stricter adherence to counselling timelines, policy reforms to prevent repeated delays, and better planning to ensure government medical institutions do not suffer from these inefficiencies. They also emphasize the need for transparency, efficient communication, and adherence to schedules to maintain the trust of the medical community.
