CSAB 2026 PwD Eligibility – Criteria & Registration

CSAB (Central Seat Allocation Board) conducts Special Round 1 (SR1) and Special Round 2 (SR2) to fill NIT, IIIT, and GFTI seats left vacant after JoSAA's main counselling process. Persons with Disabilities (PwD) receive a 5% horizontal reservation across every vertical category — General, EWS, OBC-NCL, SC, and ST — throughout CSAB, mirroring the reservation policy used in JoSAA. Understanding exactly who qualifies, what certificate is required, and how to register correctly is critical since eligibility errors are one of the most common reasons candidates lose their reserved seat during document verification.

To be recognized as PwD for CSAB purposes, a candidate must have a "benchmark disability" — defined as 40% or more disability — under one of the categories listed in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 (RPwD Act). This is distinct from simply having a medical condition; the disability must be certified, quantified, and documented by an authorized medical board.

A valid PwD certificate for CSAB must be issued by a Medical Board constituted by the central or state government — typically operating out of a government hospital, Composite Regional Centre for Persons with Disabilities, or District Disability Rehabilitation Centre. Certificates from private clinics, individual doctors without board authorization, or informal assessments are not accepted for reservation purposes.

The certificate must specify the exact disability type, the assessed percentage of disability (which must be 40% or above), and whether the condition is permanent or subject to periodic review. If your certificate has a review date (common for progressive conditions), you must ensure it remains valid throughout the CSAB counselling and reporting period — an expired review certificate can result in your PwD status being rejected even if you were provisionally allotted a PwD seat.

How Horizontal Reservation Interacts with Vertical Categories

PwD reservation works differently from category reservations like SC, ST, OBC-NCL, and EWS. Those are vertical reservations — separate, parallel seat pools. PwD is horizontal, meaning it slices through each vertical category rather than standing apart from them. Concretely: if you are a General category candidate with a valid PwD certificate, you are considered for the General-PwD sub-quota (5% of General seats). If you are OBC-NCL with a PwD certificate, you compete for the OBC-NCL-PwD sub-quota, and so on for SC-PwD, ST-PwD, and EWS-PwD. You never compete against PwD candidates from a different vertical category for the same PwD seat.

PwD status in CSAB is not something you can newly declare at the CSAB registration stage — it must have been marked in your original JEE Main application form, where candidates select their PwD status and specify the disability type. This data carries forward automatically into JoSAA and then into CSAB, since all three systems draw from the same central JEE Main candidate database.

During CSAB registration, check your candidate dashboard to confirm your PwD flag and vertical category are correctly reflected before you begin choice filling. While filling choices, PwD candidates are generally shown both PwD-specific seat options and their regular category seat options within the same interface — it is advisable to fill both types of choices, prioritized by your actual preference, rather than only PwD-designated seats, since this maximizes your chances of getting an allotment in each round.

Document Verification for PwD Candidates

If provisionally allotted a PwD seat, you will need to undergo document verification, which may include a review of your disability certificate by the reporting institute's medical board or an assigned verification authority. Carry your original certificate along with the required photocopies, and be prepared for a physical or documentary re-assessment in case of any ambiguity in the certificate's validity or disability percentage.