Now Reading: NEET-SS qualifying percentile cut to 30%, stray round begins
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NEET-SS qualifying percentile cut to 30%, stray round begins
The Story in Brief
The National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences has reduced the qualifying percentile for NEET-SS 2025 from the 50th to the 30th percentile, making approximately 6,000 additional candidates eligible for counselling. The decision follows a Supreme Court order and the government’s agreement on 17 September to address the 1,857 vacant super-speciality seats after the second counselling round.
The Medical Counselling Committee began a stray round on 25 September 2026 to fill the remaining seats. The Centre also returned 40 vacant in-service seats to Tamil Nadu following a petition by the Tamil Nadu Medical Officers Association. NBEMS said it will not issue revised scorecards, the rank declared on 23 January remains unchanged. Candidates whose tie-breaker MBBS marks are found incorrect may face cancellation.
Indian Opinion Analysis
The new sources shift the focus from the Education Ministry’s CBT plan for NEET-UG to a separate, already decided cut-off reduction for NEET-SS 2025. The Hindu frames this as part of a long-standing legal and vacancy problem, tracing the issue through court interventions since 2023 and emphasizing the Tamil Nadu in-service quota dispute. CNBC-TV18 treats the 30th-percentile cut-off as a straightforward policy announcement, listing revised scores without discussing the vacancy crisis or state-level grievances. The Nagaland Post PTI copy on the CBT plan is neutral wire reporting, identical to the previous version. Taken together, the coverage splits across two distinct exams: NEET-UG’s planned online transition, still pending the task force report, and NEET-SS’s implemented cut-off reduction, now in its stray counselling round ending on 30 September 2026.
Coverage: 3 sources, 3 neutral
Sources (3): thehindu.com (neutral report), nagalandpost.com (neutral report), cnbctv18.com (neutral report)
This brief was synthesised by AI from the 3 sources linked above, so one read covers every framing they carry. Methodology and corrections.
Update, 3 October 2026: this story now draws on 3 sources.
