According to the government’s All India Survey for Higher Education 2021-22 released by the Ministry of Education late night on Thursday, Uttar Pradesh has the highest number of colleges in the country, followed by Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Telangana and West Bengal are the other seven states which feature among the top 10 states for having the highest number of colleges in India.

AISHE survey conducted since 2011, covers all higher educational institutions located in India that impart higher education in the country. There are 45,473 colleges registered under AISHE belonging to the 328 universities (affiliating). Of these 42,825 responded in the survey year 2021-22.

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As per the report, there are 8,375 colleges in Uttar Pradesh — up from 8,114 colleges in the previous year. Maharashtra comes second with 4,692 colleges. Karnataka is at the third position with 4,430 colleges while Rajasthan is at the fourth position with 3,934 colleges. The fifth position goes to Tamil Nadu with 2,829 colleges.

Madhya Pradesh is at the sixth position with 2,702 colleges. The seventh spot is taken by Andhra Pradesh with 2,602 colleges and at eighth position Gujarat has 2,395 colleges. The ninth and tenth positions are taken by Telangana and West Bengal with 2,083 colleges and 1,514 colleges respectively.

Of the total 42,825 colleges covered in the survey, the report revealed that more than 60 per cent colleges are general in nature, 8.7 per cent colleges are specialised in education or teacher education, 6.1 per cent colleges are engineering and technology institutions, 4.3 per cent nursing colleges and 3.5 per cent medical colleges.

“Out of the 42,825 responding colleges, 14,197 colleges are offering PG programmes and 1,063 have PhD enrolments,” revealed the report.

Bengaluru Urban district has maximum colleges (1,106) followed by the Jaipur (703), Hyderabad (491), Pune (475), Prayagraj (398), Rangareddi (349), Bhopal (344), Ghazipur (333), Sikar (330) and Nagpur (326).

The total enrolment across India in higher education institutions is estimated to be 4,32,68,181 out of which 96,38,345 are in universities and their constituent units. Meanwhile, 3,14,59,092 are in colleges, and 21,70,744 in stand-alone institutions.

(With inputs from news agency PTI)