India’s top government autonomous colleges 2024-25

For mysterious reasons government autonomous colleges are rarely ranked by the Union education ministry and media publications. EducationWorld is an exception because we appreciate them as islands of collegiate education excellence: Writes, Summiya Yasmeen India’s 979 autonomous undergrad colleges have a special place of honour within the national higher education system. They constitute just 2.1 percent of the country’s 45,473 colleges and have passed stringent criteria prescribed by the apex Delhi-based University Grants Commission (UGC) for conferment of prized autonomous status. According to UGC rules, to qualify for autonomous status, all applicant colleges — government and private — must be of more than ten years vintage and “accredited by either NAAC (National Assessment and Accreditation Council) with minimum ‘A’ Grade or the NBA (National Board of Accreditation of the All India Council for Technical Education) for at least three programmes, or be awarded autonomy by a corresponding accreditation grade/score from a UGC empanelled accreditation agency”. After conferment of autonomous status, chosen colleges are permitted to restructure, redesign and prescribe their own syllabi and curriculums, introduce new study programmes; evolve independent performance evaluation systems, conduct examinations and notify results. They are also allowed to issue mark sheets, migration and other certificates. Although their degrees are awarded by the affiliating state university, the name of the college is permitted to be inscribed on the degree certificate and they carry great weight with potential employers in industry and business. Though of the 979 colleges conferred autonomy by UGC (as on June 12, 2023), the majority — 786 — are privately promoted, a small minority — 193 — of state government-owned colleges have also passed UGC’s rigorous assessment tests to qualify for autonomous status. While there’s a perceived quality gap between private and government autonomous colleges, the latter serve an important social purpose by providing heavily subsidised collegiate education to youth from low-income households. For mysterious reasons, government autonomous colleges are rarely ranked by the Union education ministry and media publications. EducationWorld is an exception because we appreciate them as islands of excellence among government higher undergrad education institutions. To acknowledge their status and encourage undergrad colleges to improve continuously since 2020, India’s best Arts, Science and Commerce (ASC) colleges have been divided into private autonomous, government autonomous and non-autonomous colleges and ranked separately in each category. The 2024-25 EW league table of best government autonomous colleges shows a re-arrangement of top table seating. The 2,100 knowledgeable sample respondents comprising higher education faculty, students and industry representatives interviewed by Bengaluru-based AZ Research Partners Pvt. Ltd have voted the Government Degree College for Women, Begumpet, Hyderabad #1 (#2 in 2023-24) followed by Maharaja’s College, Kochi at #2 (#1) and Presidency College, Chennai at #3 (#3). Promoted in 1971 and awarded autonomous status in 2012 by UGC, Government Degree College for Women, Begumpet (GDCW) has been steadily rising in the EW league table — from #5 in 2022-23 to #2 last year, and to #1 in 2024-25. The college is awarded top scores under the parameters…