February began as an eventful month for medical students with multiple notifications released for undergraduate and postgraduate aspirants. From the revision of NEET Super Speciality eligibility criteria to FMGE result and extension for MBBS internship for NEET PG, here’s what all happened in the medical education sector this week. Aspirants, FAIMA protest demanding postponement of NEET PG 2023 NEET PG aspirants, along with the FAIMA delegation, on February 7 protested at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi demanding the postponement of the exam. Candidates are urging the authorities to postpone the medical entrance exam to May or June stating that there is a huge gap between the counselling and the examination date. In response, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on February 10 told Lok Sabha that the NEET-PG examination will be conducted as per schedule on March 5 for those aspiring to get admission to postgraduate medical courses. “On March 5, the examination has to be conducted and this was declared five months ago. Those students, who had to appear for it (entrance test), are already preparing,” the minister said in his response. NEET PG 2023: MBBS internship completion deadline extended Considering the requests of thousands of students, Union Health Ministry has extended the cut-off date for MBBS aspirants to complete their mandatory one-year internship to August 11. Earlier, on January 13, the cut-off date was extended from March 31 to June 30. With this decision, more than 13,000 MBBS students across 5 states/UTs will now be eligible for NEET PG 2023 exam. The National Board of Examinations (NBE) will re-open the registration window for such students on February 9 which will remain available till February 12. Moreover, to benefit 3000 BDS students across States/UTs, MoHFW has decided to extend the last date of completion of the internship for eligibility to June 30. Such students will now be eligible to appear in NEET MDS 2023. 94% rise in MBBS seats since 2014 reveals Govt data There has been a 69 per cent increase in the number of medical colleges in the country, from 387 before 2014 to 654 as of now, the government informed Parliament today. Moreover, there has been a 94 per cent rise in the number of MBBS seats, from 51,348 to 99,763, and a 107 per cent increase in the number of postgraduate (PG) seats, from 31,185 before 2014 to 64,559 as of now, Minister of State for Health Bharati Pravin Pawar said in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha. Change in NEET SS Eligibility criterion The Union Health Ministry on February 7 announced its decision to lower the eligibility requirement for NEET-Super Speciality (SS) courses from 50 percentile to 20 percentile after consulting the matter with the National Medical Commission (NMC). Candidates who have scored 20 percentile and above in the NEET-Super Speciality (SS) will be eligible to participate in the “special mop-up round” The eligible candidates for the additional round will be those scoring 20th percentile and above — in all subjects — in the NEET-SS 2022 examination conducted by the NBE. FDST Result 2022 announced The National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS) on February 9 declared the result of the Foreign Dental Screening Test (FDST) for BDS graduates. In this year’s exam, a total of 11 candidates have qualified for the viva-voce exam out of 22 candidates. FDST 2022 for BDS graduates was conducted on January 20 by NBEMS on a computer-based platform in New Delhi. The exam is conducted for Indian citizens and Overseas Citizen Of India (OCI) who have primary dental qualifications from any dental institution outside India. FMGE 2023 registration The online application process for Foreign Medical Graduate Examination (FMGE) June 2023 started on February 9. Candidates have time till March 8 to complete the process. NBE will tentatively conduct the exam in June. NEET UG 2023 Registration The National Testing Agency (NTA) is soon going to release the exam dates and registration schedule for NEET UG 2023. The exam is tentatively scheduled to be held in May. In 2022, a total of 18.72 lakh candidates registered for the exam, which is the country’s biggest common entrance held by the National Testing Agency (NTA). The test was held across 3,570 centers in 497 cities in India and 14 cities abroad.
