Karnataka established the maximum number of colleges [181] in the country in 2019, according to data from the All-India Survey on Higher Education 2019-2020, which was released on Thursday.
However, most of these colleges were in the private unaided category. Only 18 were government colleges, while 10 were in the aided category, and the remaining 153 fell under the private unaided category. The survey also revealed that 7,915 students were enrolled in these 181 colleges. On an average, this works out to around 43 students per college. M.R. Doreswamy, adviser to the State government on education reforms and Chancellor of PES University, attributed the low enrollment in some colleges to the trend of students choosing professional courses, such as engineering, medical and management courses. Karnataka also has the highest number of students enrolled in nursing courses--55,338 students.
“There is huge demand for some courses, but conventional course combinations in BA and BSc programmes do not see many takers. One of my recommendations to the State government is to make these courses more attractive,” said Mr. Doreswamy.
An official in the Higher Education Department however said that this year with all class 12 students deemed as pass without examination, seats across all courses are likely to be filled.
Although Karnataka has the third highest number of colleges in the country, the average enrolment per college dipped from 426 in 2018-19 to 415 in the 2019-20 academic year. Incidentally, the average enrolment per college across the country stood at 680 for the 2019-2020 academic year. Bengaluru Urban district had the highest number of colleges (1,009), a trend seen in previous years, too.
