Every year, the National Testing Agency conducts the annual examination of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG) for Undergraduate admissions to medical, AYUSH, and dental courses in India. The exam serves as an entry point for students seeking admission to Indian medical colleges. Additionally, for students planning to study MBBS from abroad too, qualifying for the NEET exam is a mandatory requirement. 

NEET 2020: More Candidates, More Seats

For NEET 2019, there was reportedly a 14.52% rise in the number of registered applications, which is expected to rise further for NEET 2020 given the fresh inclusion of AIIMS/JIPMER in the list of NEET-based institutes. The same had been proposed in the National Medical Commission Bill of 2019 wherein it was said that NEET should be the single entry-level examination for medical aspirants in India. 

For 2019 admissions, the Institutes of National Importance had recorded around 5 lakh registrations for admission to 1,205 seats of AIIMS and 200 seats of JIPMER. Keeping the same into consideration, the registrations for NEET 2020 are expected to rise by the same proportion with an addition to the number of medical seats by around 1,405.

NEET 2020: Key Points

1. The National Testing Agency on Monday, December 2, 2019, opened the window for NEET 2020 registrations, at 4 PM.
2. The last day for registration is December 31, 2019, while the last day for payment of fee is January 1, 2020.
3. Admit cards for the exam will be released from March 27, 2020.
4. The National Eligibility cum Entrance Test will be conducted on May 03, 2020 from 2 PM to 5 PM.
5. The examination will be conducted offline in pen and paper mode testing the candidates over a total of 180 questions.
6. Each correct answer would award the candidate 4 marks while every wrong answer would deduct 1 mark. Therefore the total achievable marks for NEET are 720.
7. For the 2020 session, Leh city (Ladakh) has been the new addition to the list of cities hosting the examination.
8. The numbers of seats open for admission via NEET 2020 are as follows –
   1. 75893 for MBBS
   2. 26693 for BDS
   3. 1205 in AIIMS
   4. 200 in JIPMER
9. The result for NEET 2020 is expected to be released on June 4, 2020, which will be followed by counseling sessions from the second week of June 2020. 

NEET 2020: Language Preference

NEET is conducted all across India in 11 languages (2 national languages and 9 regional languages) including Hindi, English, Urdu, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Gujarati, Odia, Assamese, Marathi, and Kannada. Looking into the statistics for the year 2019, 79.31% of total candidates opted for English as a language while Hindi was chosen by 11.84% of candidates. The remaining 8.86% opted for regional languages. 

The Information Bulletin for NEET 2020 with all guidelines has so far been released in 7 languages – Assamese, English, Kannada, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, and Urdu. The official NTA website has also released a list of  155 cities that will be holding the examination on May 03, 2020. 

Registering for NEET 2020: What’s New

• To register for NEET 2020, candidates are required to upload a postcard size image (file size: 10-100kb) with a white background. 
• Additionally, the candidate must have his/her name and date printed below the image. 
• The signature file (file size: 3-20kb) of the candidate must be in black on a white background. 
• As an added measure for better scanning of applicants, it has been made mandatory that the students will have to upload their Class Xth certificates (file size: 100-400kb)

Qualifying NEET 2020

To qualify NEET 2020 for admission, the following criteria have been set –

What after NEET 2020: Top Medical Colleges in India Accepting NEET 2020 Scores

The government has also allotted reservations to certain sections of the society for the allotment of medical seats.