India has less than 6 Medical college seats for every lakh population
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
September 12, 2017
Thousands of Indian students go abroad every year to pursue medical education. In adequate number of medical seats in India is one of the reasons for students going abroad. For the 2017-18 academic year, there are just over 67000 medical seats and over 27000 dental seats across the country. This translates to less than 6 medical seats per one lakh population and fewer than 3 dental seats per one lakh population.
A large number of Indian students go abroad for medical education every year. This is partly to do with the fewer number of medical seats available in the country. The number of seats has not kept pace with the growing demand.  For the 2017-18 admission season, there were a total of 67218 medical seats on offer across the country, which translates to less than 6 seats for every lakh population.
Most number of seats in Karnataka
It has to be noted that though there is all-India quota in NEET, a large number of seats are still reserved under the state quota. Hence number of seats in a particular state are important.  Of all the states, Karnataka with 8845 has the most medical seats on offer followed by 7270 in Maharashtra. A total of 18 States/UTs have more than 1000 seats each. Eight (8) States/UTs have fewer than 500 seats each. Tamil Nadu has the most number of medical seats in government colleges followed by Maharashtra. Three states of Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram & Nagaland do not have a single medical college.
Fewer than 6 Medical seats for every one lakh population
At an All-India level, there are fewer than 6 seats per one lakh population. Of all the States/UTs, Puducherry has more than 96 seats per one lakh population because of the presence of JIPMER and relatively lower population. Of the States/UTs with more than a crore population, Karnataka has more than 14 medical seats per one lakh population, the highest in the country. Only Kerala & Telangana are two other states with more than 10 seats per one lakh population. Of the bigger states, only Bihar & Jharkhand have less than 2 seats per one lakh population. This is 4 times lower compared to national average.
More than 27000 Dental seats on offer
In addition to the medical seats, there are more than 27000 dental seats across the country. Karnataka with 3520 leads in the number of seats followed by Maharashtra & Tamil Nadu. Eleven (11) States/UTs have more than 1000 dental seats each. Thirteen (13) States/UTs have fewer than 500 dental seats. Six (6) states namely Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura, Sikkim, Nagaland do not have a single dental college.
On average, there are fewer than 3 dental seats per one lakh population at an all-India level. Bihar & Assam are at the bottom of the list when it comes to number of seats per one lakh people. Both these states have less than 0.5 seats per one lakh population. Five (5) states have fewer than one seat per one lakh population.
Featured Image: Medical college seats in India