Few takers for MBBS seats at Patna’s AIIMS

The AIIMS-Patna, with six unfilled MBBS seats, is second only to Tamil Nadu’s AIIMS-Madurai in having a higher percentage of vacant undergraduate (UG) seats among the 19 new AIIMS in India, said government officials.

The AIIMS-Patna, with six unfilled MBBS seats, is second only to Tamil Nadu’s AIIMS-Madurai in having a higher percentage of vacant undergraduate (UG) seats among the 19 new AIIMS in India, said government officials.

AIIMS-Patna, with six unfilled MBBS seats, is second only to Tamil Nadu’s AIIMS-Madurai, which has 13 vacant seats. (HT Archives)

The AIIMS-Madurai is left with 13 vacant MBBS seats after four rounds of all-India quota counselling since January this year, said officials.

Altogether 14 of the 19 new AIIMS have MBBS seats vacant for the 2021-22 academic session. Of them, three vacancies each exist at Jharkhand’s AIIMS-Deoghar and Telangana’s AIIMS-Bibi Nagar; two each at Assam’s AIIMS-Guwahati, Gujarat’s AIIMS-Rajkot, AIIMS-Jammu and Punjab’s AIIMS-Bathinda. Besides, one vacancy each exists at AIIMS-Raipur (in Chhattisgarh), AIIMS-Nagpur (Maharashtra), AIIMS-Bhubaneswar (Odisha), AIIMS-Raebareli (Uttar Pradesh), AIIMS-Rishikesh (Uttarakhand) and AIIMS-Kalyani (West Bengal).

“The seat matrix for special stray vacancy round counselling for MBBS seats is a pointer to the popularity of an institution. Clearly, the AIIMS-Patna is not popular among medical aspirants,” said an MBBS student at the institute who did not wish to be named.

This year, admissions for MBBS first-year students at the institute began with rank 103 in the National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET) for undergraduates.

“We have got students who performed better in NEET this year as compared to last year. Last year, our admission began with rank 869 as against 103 this year. This is an indication of preference for AIIMS-Patna improving among brighter students,” said Dr Umesh Kumar Bhadani, dean (academics) at Patna’s AIIMS.

Asked about the vacant seats, he said: “It’s surprising why our MBBS seats are vacant. It’s probably because of the skewed system. Some better ranked NEET students, who qualified for AIIMS-Patna through the all-India quota, did not join us this year probably because they got admission in their home state through the state quota,” said Dr Bhadani.

He said the government needs to look into the option of students applying under both the Central and the state quota and then deciding which institution to join.

The special stray vacancy round counselling will be conducted online on Friday, when the six seats will be on offer for the eligible candidates of the NEET UG, 2021. All pre-registered candidates, not holding any seat, are eligible to participate in it, said a notice of the Medical Counselling Committee of the directorate general of health services, posted on its website on April 18.

The results will be declared on April 23 and students have to report at the allotted medical college between April 24 and 28.

The special stray vacancy round is to fill the vacant seats so that the all-India quota seats are not wasted at medical colleges.