Andaman & Nicobar NEET PG Counselling: Timelines, The One College That Matters, And A Domicile System Rooted In 1942

Introduction

Thirteen. That's the entire government PG medical seat count across the whole of Andaman & Nicobar Islands — spread across just six specialities (Anaesthesiology, Surgery, Ophthalmology, Anatomy, Microbiology, and Biochemistry) at a single institution. If you're used to researching PG counselling in states with thousands of seats across dozens of colleges, this number resets your entire frame of reference. Every seat here is genuinely precious, and the process reflects that scale — smaller, more personal, and built around a domicile system that traces its categories back to who settled the islands, and when.

This guide covers Andaman & Nicobar's PG counselling in full — the single institution that runs it, the genuinely unusual domicile categories worth understanding, and what the coming months are likely to look like.

Who Runs This, And Where To Check?

PG counselling for Andaman & Nicobar Islands runs through the Andaman & Nicobar Islands Institute of Medical Sciences (ANIIMS), Port Blair, coordinated by the Directorate of Health Services (DHS), Andaman & Nicobar Administration. Registration happens through the Common College Admission Portal, at collegeadmission.andaman.gov.in, alongside ANIIMS's own institutional site. Given the islands' genuinely small administrative scale, it's worth checking both the admission portal and the institute's notice board directly and regularly, since updates here don't always get the same wide circulation that larger states' notifications receive.

ANIIMS is the only government PG medical college in the Union Territory, attached to GB Pant Hospital — the sole tertiary care centre serving the entire islands region. That single-hospital, single-institution reality shapes essentially everything about how PG counselling works here.

Timeline For Andaman & Nicobar NEET PG Counselling

Neither ANIIMS nor DHS had released a confirmed 2026 PG-specific schedule at the time of writing. Given the islands' UG counselling has historically opened its registration window not long after NEET results, here's a tentative timeline built on that pattern:

Given how few seats are actually in play — 13 total, with the AIQ share carved out separately by MCC — rounds here can conclude quickly once they begin, simply because there's very little left to allocate after the first pass. ANIIMS's own past notices have explicitly cautioned that counselling dates are tentative and subject to change, with candidates advised to check the institute's notice board regularly rather than relying on a single announcement — sound advice worth taking at face value.

A Domicile System Rooted In The Islands' Own History

This is genuinely the most distinctive thing about Andaman & Nicobar's counselling, and it's worth understanding properly rather than skimming past it. State quota eligibility here runs through a structured, multi-category local domicile system — historically defined across categories that include:

• Category I — Bona fide local residents meeting the standard, general local eligibility criteria.
• Category II — Deputationists and Central Government employees carrying a transfer liability to serve outside the Union Territory, specifically provided they've studied their last two qualifying years in the Islands and passed their qualifying examination from a school there.
• Category III — Settlers who were settled in the islands prior to 1942, and those settled under various rehabilitation schemes introduced after the re-occupation of the Islands following World War II.
• Category V — Any unutilised seat from the categories above, redistributed once earlier category pools are exhausted.

This is a genuinely unusual structure — most states' domicile rules revolve around years of residency or school attendance alone, but Andaman & Nicobar's system carries real historical weight, tracing eligibility back to specific pre-war and post-war settlement waves. If your family's connection to the islands runs through a specific historical settlement scheme, or through a parent's central government posting there, it's genuinely worth working out precisely which category applies to you rather than assuming general residency automatically covers it.

Registration: A Genuinely Manual Step Worth Knowing About

Historically, ANIIMS has required application fees to be paid via Demand Draft, made out to "ANIIMS, Admission," payable at Canara Bank, DHS Building, Port Blair — with cash and cheque payments explicitly not accepted. This is a distinctly more manual, paperwork-driven step than the fully digital fee payment systems most larger states now run, and it's worth planning for accordingly — arranging a Demand Draft takes actual time and a visit to a bank, unlike a same-day online card payment.

How Andaman & Nicobar's PG Seats Are Divided?

Given the AIQ and state quota cutoffs for ANIIMS are actually released by two different bodies — MCC for AIQ, the Department of Higher Education for state quota — it's worth checking both sources rather than assuming a single unified cutoff list covers everything.

Eligibility Basics

• Completed MBBS from an NMC-recognised institution, with the compulsory internship completed by the specified deadline.
• NEET PG qualified, at the applicable percentile for your category.
• Valid NMC or State Medical Council registration.
• For State Quota: eligibility under one of the Islands' specific local domicile categories (I, II, III, or the residual Category V), as defined by the current notification.

How Does the Process Run, Step By Step?

1. Registration through the Common College Admission Portal, with category/quota selection (General, ST, OBC, EWS, PwBD, etc.).
2. Application fee payment, historically via Demand Draft rather than online payment.
3. Document upload, scanned clearly to avoid rejection at verification.
4. Merit list publication — state quota cutoffs from the Department of Higher Education, AIQ cutoffs from MCC.
5. Counselling rounds, with seat allotment based on rank, category, and preferences.
6. Reporting to ANIIMS with original documents, bond agreement, and fee payment to confirm admission.
7. Upgradation rounds, where candidates unsatisfied with an initial allotment can participate in subsequent rounds if seats remain.

Given the genuinely tiny seat pool, it's worth reading every round's specific seat availability carefully, since even one or two seats shifting between categories can meaningfully change your realistic chances from one round to the next.

Documents Worth Having Ready Now

• NEET PG scorecard and admit card (once the result is declared)
• MBBS degree and internship completion certificate
• NMC/State Medical Council registration
• Local domicile/settler category documentation, matching your specific category (I, II, or III)
• Category certificate, where applying under a reserved category
• Photo ID and recent photographs
• Demand Draft, prepared in advance per ANIIMS's specified format

A Few Things Worth Checking Before You Commit

Work out precisely which local domicile category applies to your situation well before registration — this genuinely isn't a simple residency check, and getting it wrong at application stage can cause real delays.

Arrange your Demand Draft in advance rather than waiting until close to a deadline, since this step requires a physical bank visit rather than a same-day digital payment.

Check both MCC's AIQ cutoff releases and the Department of Higher Education's state quota cutoff list separately, since ANIIMS's overall seat matrix draws from both sources.

Given how few seats are actually available, treat every round's notification carefully — the margin for assuming "there'll be more seats later" is genuinely much thinner here than in a large state.

Check ANIIMS's notice board and the admission portal regularly rather than relying on a single date-specific announcement, since the institute itself has cautioned that schedules are tentative and subject to change.

FAQs

Bringing It Together

Andaman & Nicobar's PG counselling is defined by scale — just 13 seats across six specialities at a single institution, ANIIMS, Port Blair — and by a domicile system that carries genuine historical depth, distinguishing settlers who arrived before 1942 from later rehabilitation-scheme arrivals and from Central Government employees on transfer postings. None of this makes the process complicated so much as it makes it precise: understanding your exact eligibility category, arranging a Demand Draft in advance, and treating every one of those 13 seats as genuinely consequential.

Confirm your specific domicile category early, prepare your Demand Draft well ahead of the deadline, and keep collegeadmission.andaman.gov.in and ANIIMS's own notice board as your two dependable sources through the rest of the cycle.