In a significant boost to postgraduate medical education and an effort to address the shortage of qualified doctors, the National Medical Commission (NMC) has so far cleared around 450 additional postgraduate (PG) medical seats for academic year 2025-26. The approvals were granted after the Medical Assessment and Rating Board’s (MARB) First Appeal Committee reviewed appeals filed by medical colleges across the country.
The decision followed multiple meetings of the First Appeal Committee held on December 29, 30 and 31, 2025, under Section 28(5) of the NMC Act, 2019. The additional seats span a wide range of clinical and non-clinical disciplines, including General Medicine, Radiodiagnosis, Dermatology (DVL), General Surgery, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Paediatrics, Psychiatry, Orthopaedics, ENT, Ophthalmology, Emergency Medicine and Anaesthesiology, among others.
According to a public notice issued by MARB on January 6, 2026, the list of additional seats approved by the appeal committee will be treated as a valid document for the counselling process. Counselling authorities have been instructed not to wait for individual Letters of Permission (LOPs) from institutions, although the LOPs will be issued shortly.
Medical colleges from more than 20 states and Union Territories, including Maharashtra, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Karnataka, Haryana, Punjab, Manipur and Uttarakhand, have received approvals for additional seats. Several institutions were granted multiple seats across departments, leading to a significant expansion of PG training capacity for the upcoming academic session.
High-demand specialties such as MD General Medicine, MD Radiodiagnosis, MS General Surgery and MD Dermatology account for a substantial share of the newly sanctioned seats. In several cases, colleges witnessed a sharp rise in their total sanctioned intake following the appeal committee’s intervention, particularly in core clinical disciplines.
In a subsequent communication dated January 7, 2026, NMC Secretary Dr Raghav Langer formally informed all medical colleges, state medical education departments and counselling authorities to take note of the additional seats and ensure their immediate inclusion in the PG admissions process.
The move is expected to ease pressure during NEET-PG counselling, improve specialty-wise seat availability, and strengthen postgraduate medical training infrastructure nationwide for the 2025-26 academic cycle.
On PG admissions, Dr M K Ramesh, President of the Medical Assessment and Rating Board, told the media, “PG seat approvals by the first appeal committee are cumulative and ongoing. While earlier notices cited 171 and later 262 additional seats, the total cleared through appeals so far is around 450, with further additions possible.”
