MUMBAI: MBBS aspirants who missed out in the initial rounds of seat allotment and pinned their hopes on vacant NRI quota seats have been bested by students at the tail end of the NEET qualifying list helped by NRI sponsors.
Overnight, close to 152 aspirants, many of them with ranks in six digits, have submitted documents, including a certificate from the consulate concerned, to prove that their education will be sponsored by an Indian based abroad. Aspirants with much higher scores, who were banking on the addition of vacant NRI seats to the relatively cheaper management quota — the fee differential can be as much as Rs 25 lakh-35 lakh — have been done in by a minor clause in the fineprint. A medical college in Maharashtra has, in fact, already allotted a seat to a NEET qualifier placed 267th from the bottom in a list stretching into several lakhs.
