A few years back I would have told MS/MD is better than DNB for the simple reason that the selection process for DNB was highly suspect. You getting into a DNB program depended on the right kind of people you knew or on the mercy of the institute you were working as a medical officer. It wasn't at all fair. There was no credibility for the doctor getting in. Also pass percentage was extremely low in ortho and radio it was less than 10% pass rate. The centres never bothered about results hence no academics

But things have changed since 2010. There is an All India DNB entrance exam and a central counselling process for both primary and secondary DNB which now adds credibility to the course and now pass rates are approaching 100% in most centers as institutes realize only having slave labour won't cut it and they will have high attrition rates if they don't invest energy into academics and teaching.

Also now with Supreme Court order removing that last strand of ambiguity saying DNB and MS/MD is equivalent I don't see why I should not recommend DNB. The biggest advantage of DNB is that they get to work in the best facilities, in the top institutes with large resources available and always on the cutting edge of work done.

So many of my friends and colleagues who have done DNB from big centres are doing extremely well sometimes much better than their MS/MD counterparts. With the dismal state of most medical colleges in India I see these top institutes having DNB leading the way forward in the near future.

A lot of government and private medical colleges don't have good infrastructure and are staffed by retiring and retired professors. These people do not make good mentors as they are not interested in teaching the residents or making them competent surgically for the real world. Some colleges don't even give residents a chance to operate. The MCI teams which come to inspect the infrastructure are all corrupt and clear these colleges due to either political or financial clout. The MCI does not have a structured program for Residency (academic and surgical) so the level of training is variable depending on the college and guide you land up with.

As an example I did my Ophthalmology Residency from Regional Institute of Ophthalmology, Kolkata in which I found excellent mentors and incredible surgical experience. I doubt any other medical college in India can come close to the number of surgeries a resident does in RIO- Kolkata. I was extremely lucky. Contrast that to AMU, Aligarh or BHU, Varanasi. Supposedly both are central institutes with good funding and facilities but they both have terrible residency programs with residents hardly performing 10 cataracts surgeries (if lucky) in 3 years of residency. Or contrast that to all private medical colleges in Karnataka where I hail from. Most of these residents would not have done a single cataract surgery by the end of their residency.

I'm not saying it won't happen in DNB institutes but they have profits driving their infrastructure and having residents who won't leave them make economic sense to them. They will always try to keep the standards high.

In conclusion I would say both are equivalent and of the same value when it comes to jobs. The center you do it is more important than the MD/MS/DNB label.