NEET 2023 – Central Government Declares 27% OBC & 10% EWS Reservation Under AIQ

New Delhi, 30 July 2021 – In a landmark decision, the central government announced OBC and EWS reservation approval within All India Quota (AIQ) for undergraduate and postgraduate medical/dental courses (MBBS/MS/MD/ Diploma/MDS/BDS). 

27% reservation has been approved for OBC (Other Backward Class) students in addition to 10% reservation for EWS (Economically Weaker Section), which will be implemented from the academic year 2021-22 onwards. This reservation under the All India Quota is likely to benefit nearly 5,500 students.

NEET Reservation 2021 – Benefit to 5550 Students

PM Narendra Modi chaired a meeting on 26th July 2021, wherein he directed the concerned ministries to facilitate an effective solution to this long pending issue. PM Modi took the opportunity to declare the reservation benefits for OBC and EWS category students in the field of medicine, on the occasion of the New Education Policy (NEP) 2020 completing a year. As per the decision taken yesterday, the medical reservation would benefit:

• 1500 OBC students aspiring to pursue MBBS 
• 550 EWS students aspiring to pursue MBBS
• 2500 OBC students in postgraduation
• 1000 EWS students in postgraduation

Our Government has taken a landmark decision for providing 27% reservation for OBCs and 10% reservation for Economically Weaker Section in the All India Quota Scheme for undergraduate and postgraduate medical/dental courses from the current academic year. https://t.co/gv2EygCZ7N

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) July 29, 2021

A Glimpse of All India Quota (AIQ) in Medical Education

• Under the directions of the Supreme Court, the All India Quota (AIQ) scheme was introduced in 1986. 
• It offers domicile-free merit-based opportunities to students from any state to study in good medical colleges located in other states. 
• 50% of the total available postgraduate seats and 15% of undergraduate seats in government medical colleges come under the All India Quota.

NEET Reservation Policy 2021 – What Happened Earlier?

Until 2007, no reservation of any kind was implemented for medical admissions within the All India Quota (AIQ). However, on 31st January 2007, the Supreme Court directed 15% reservation for SC and 7.5% for ST be introduced under NEET AIQ. As a result of the 27% reservation, the OBC students were provided seats in the state government medical and dental colleges. However, this reservation benefit was still not helping the students get seats in state colleges, specifically under NEET All India Quota (AIQ). 

While the 10% EWS quota had been implemented in central medical and dental institutions under the Constitution 103 Amendment Act, 2019, it still did not come under NEET AIQ for state institutions. 

Apart from the above incidents, there were a series of events that led to this reservation decision:

• For many years, OBC and EWS category students were denied reservations in medical colleges, which was a subject of protest. 
• Last July, Tamil Nadu’s ruling party, DMK, and its allies filed a petition in the Madras High Court (HC) regarding the same. 
• HC ruled in favour of DMK, announcing that OBC students too can avail reservation under the NEET All India Quota. 
• According to HC’s decision, the reservation could not be implemented for the academic year 2019-20. However,  it would now be implemented from the academic year 2021-22. 
• However, when the NEET 2021 notification was issued on 13th July 2021, nothing was mentioned regarding the provision for OBC reservation within the AIQ. 
• So, on 19th July 2021, the DMK filed another contempt petition, to which the High Court stated, “The Union’s attempt to not implement the OBC reservation quota in respect of the AIQ seats in the academic year 2021-22 appears to be non-compliant and in derogation to the order dated July 27, 2020, passed by this Court.”
• Finally, last evening, the implementation of OBC and EWS reservations from the upcoming academic year and onwards was announced.