Its official now: The Medical Council of India (MCI) on Friday announced to conduct National Eligibility Entrance Examination (NEET)-a Common Entrance test (CET) for under graduate medical students on May 13 next year.
For the first time ever, the “percentile-based selection system” which is currently used for entry into the Indian Institutes of Management is expected to be introduced for the CET too.
Sources in the MCI disclosed that it is likely that merit list will be prepared using percentile score. While, for general category the qualifying percentile will be 50, for reserved categories the qualifying percentile has been decided to be 40. “This would be the cut off point for both the categories,” sources said.
A minimum of 50 per cent marks would be required by a general candidates and 40 per cent by other categories for admission to MBBS courses. For the MBBS entrance examination, a three-hour duration single paper proposed a total of 180 marks exam with biology getting more weightage-90 marks and 45 each for both physics and chemistry. The MCI has also decided that there would be “no negative marking” this time. So, it has been decided that the number of “wrong attempts” would act as “tiebreaker” for cases where the score is same. “Since there is no negative marking. If there are two students scoring the same, one making more wrong attempts will be considered lower on the rank,” sources added. The MCI has this time for the first time included “Human Physiology and Plant Physiology” in the syllabus for under graduates. “The over all syllabus too has been reduced” sources further said.
The CBSE would conduct the exam. “Instead of a preliminary examination and the final test, there will be single-step exam. From this, two ranks will be generated — at all-India and state level. The students will have a choice to either go for an all-India seat or simultaneously for states.