Telangana NEET-PG 2026 Candidates: Where Did Top 15,000 Rankers Get Allotted?
How many NEET-PG candidates who listed Telangana as their permanent state received an All India Quota (AIQ) Round 1 allotment—and, among the strongest rankers, how many were allotted seats at institutes within Telangana?
To answer this, the Telangana permanent-state candidate list published by Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences (KNRUHS) was matched by NEET-PG 2026 rank against the AIQ Round 1 records in Desire’s counselling database.
The headline numbers
| Measure | Candidates |
|---|---|
| Unique ranks extracted from the Telangana list | 7,676 |
| Telangana-list candidates matched to an AIQ Round 1 allotment | 1,239 |
| Matched candidates with AIR below 15,000 | 382 |
| Of those 382, allotted to an institute in Telangana | 257 |
| Of those 382, allotted to an institute outside Telangana | 125 |
The key finding is that 257 of the 382 matched candidates with AIR below 15,000—67.3%—received an AIQ Round 1 allotment at an institute located in Telangana.
What happened to the top-15,000 rank group?
The 382 candidates are not everyone in the Telangana list with AIR below 15,000. They are the candidates who satisfy both conditions: their rank appears in the KNRUHS Telangana permanent-state list, and that rank has a matching record in the 2026 AIQ Round 1 dataset.
Among this matched group:
- 257 candidates (67.3%) were allotted an institute in Telangana.
- 125 candidates (32.7%) were allotted an institute outside Telangana.
This describes the state in which the allotted institute is located. It does not mean that the 257 candidates received a Telangana state-quota seat: these are AIQ Round 1 allotments.
How many candidates from outside Telangana took AIQ seats in Telangana?
The official KNRUHS permanent-state candidate lists for 2025 and 2026 were matched against all AIQ Round 1 allotments at institutes in Telangana, without limiting the analysis to AIR below 15,000.
| Telangana institute AIQ Round 1 allotments | 2025 | 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| All allotments | 1,433 | 1,442 | +9 |
| Candidates on the official KNRUHS Telangana permanent-state list | 666 | 654 | -12 |
| Candidates not on that list | 767 | 788 | +21 |
| Share not on the list | 53.52% | 54.65% | +1.13 percentage points |
In 2026, 788 of 1,442 AIQ Round 1 allotments at Telangana institutes (54.65%) went to candidates not on the official KNRUHS Telangana permanent-state list, compared with 767 of 1,433 (53.52%) in 2025. That is an increase of 21 allotments and 1.13 percentage points year over year.
This is a full-rank comparison of all recorded AIQ Round 1 allotments at Telangana institutes, separate from the top-15,000 analysis above. Candidates are classified by whether their AIR appears on the official KNRUHS list.
Open-category allotments: 2025 vs 2026
The year-wise final matched CSVs also allow a comparison of allotments where the allotted seat category is Open among the Telangana-list candidates under AIR 15,000 who matched to Telangana institutes.
| Measure | 2025 | 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open-category allotment rows | 175 | 165 | -10 |
| Best (lowest) AIR | 16 | 43 | +27 |
| Median AIR | 7,242 | 6,310 | -932 |
| Worst (highest) AIR | 14,929 | 14,883 | -46 |
The number of Open-category allotment rows fell by 10, from 175 in 2025 to 165 in 2026. The median AIR was numerically lower in 2026 (6,310 versus 7,242), while the best AIR in the subset was 16 in 2025 and 43 in 2026.
Here, “Open” refers to the allotted seat category, not the candidate’s category in the KNRUHS source list. These are counts from the matched final CSVs, not all Telangana AIQ allotments or all candidates in the state list.
Course-wise Open-category changes
The table below shows the actual row counts in each year’s matched final CSV. Change is calculated as 2026 minus 2025, sorted from the largest increase to the largest decrease.
| Course | 2025 | 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Radiodiagnosis | 12 | 20 | +8 |
| General Medicine | 35 | 41 | +6 |
| Ophthalmology | 3 | 6 | +3 |
| Orthopaedics | 2 | 4 | +2 |
| Radiation Oncology | 1 | 3 | +2 |
| E.N.T. | 4 | 5 | +1 |
| Pathology | 0 | 1 | +1 |
| Dermatology | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Emergency Medicine | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Radiology | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Community Medicine | 1 | 0 | -1 |
| Geriatrics | 1 | 0 | -1 |
| Neuro Surgery (6Y) | 2 | 1 | -1 |
| Psychiatry | 1 | 0 | -1 |
| Cardio Vascular Surgery (6Y) | 2 | 0 | -2 |
| Obstetrics and Gynaecology | 24 | 22 | -2 |
| Plastic Surgery (6Y) | 2 | 0 | -2 |
| Respiratory Medicine | 6 | 4 | -2 |
| Anaesthesiology | 15 | 12 | -3 |
| Paediatrics | 36 | 28 | -8 |
| General Surgery | 24 | 14 | -10 |
Within this subset, Radiodiagnosis increased from 12 to 20 rows (+8) and General Medicine from 35 to 41 (+6). General Surgery decreased from 24 to 14 (-10) and Paediatrics from 36 to 28 (-8). These are changes in recorded Open-category allotment rows, not evidence of changing candidate preferences or total seat availability.
Institute-level comparisons are omitted because the source data uses inconsistent institution names and addresses; a reliable institution-by-institution comparison requires normalization first.
How the count was calculated
The 2026 analysis used two sources:
- The KNRUHS document titled Data of Candidates Who Have Appeared for NEET PG 2026 and Uploaded Telangana as Permanent State in the Application to NBEMS, which lists candidates by NEET-PG rank.
- Desire’s Neon PostgreSQL counselling database, filtered to
counselling = 'AIQ',year = '2026', andround = 'Round 1'.
Ranks were extracted from the KNRUHS list and matched against the AIQ Round 1 records. The top-rank subset was restricted to AIR below 15,000, and matched records were grouped by the allotted institute’s state.
The 2025–2026 Open-category comparison uses the existing year-specific final matched CSVs and filters rows where allotted_category is Open (case-insensitive). It does not independently re-query Neon.
What these figures do—and do not—tell us
These results provide a snapshot of AIQ Round 1 allotments for candidates who reported Telangana as their permanent state in the KNRUHS source list. They do not show where candidates eventually joined, whether they later upgraded or exited, or what they will choose in Telangana state counselling.
The figures should not be interpreted as a measure of candidates’ preferences. An allotment depends on factors such as available seats, candidate choices, eligibility, category, quota rules, and the counselling process. The analysis counts the recorded Round 1 allotment only.
Bottom line
Of the 1,239 candidates from the KNRUHS Telangana permanent-state list who matched to NEET-PG 2026 AIQ Round 1 allotments, 382 had AIR below 15,000. Within that top-rank group, 257 were allotted institutes in Telangana and 125 outside the state.
For Open-category allotments in the matched under-15,000 subset, the row count moved from 175 in 2025 to 165 in 2026. Radiodiagnosis and General Medicine recorded the largest increases; General Surgery and Paediatrics had the largest decreases. Institution-level comparisons are not included because institute names have not yet been normalized.
That is a snapshot of recorded Round 1 allotments—not a prediction of Telangana state-quota outcomes or final admissions.
Data sources: KNRUHS Telangana permanent-state candidate list for NEET-PG 2026 and the corresponding 2025 list; Desire Neon PostgreSQL counselling data and year-specific final matched CSVs. Database scope for the original rank analysis: AIQ, 2026, Round 1. AIR below 15,000 is interpreted as rank < 15,000. Open-category comparison counts rows with allotted_category = Open in the matched final CSVs; it does not independently verify all counselling records.