28 percent of India’s universities concentrated in 20 districts: report

October 7, 2026 /Posted byPrajwal EW / 0

About 28 percent of India’s universities are concentrated in 20 districts, while states with some of the largest future student populations have comparatively fewer institutions, according to The Geography of Higher Education Report 2026, released by Jetri and Impactica.org.

The report maps the growth of India’s higher education institutions over the past 25 years and compares the distribution of capacity with projected student populations.

Since 2001, India has added 981 universities and 34,840 colleges. The number of colleges per lakh people aged 18 to 23 has increased from nine to 37, while the population in this age group has grown by 11 percent.

Bengaluru Urban has the highest number of colleges among districts, with 1,225, followed by Jaipur with 809. A total of 173 districts have 100 or more colleges.

Seven states — Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh — account for 49 percent of India’s 1,405 universities and 66 percent of its 53,433 colleges.

At current capacity levels, one university in Bihar would correspond to a future student population of about 10.3 lakh, compared with around six lakh in Uttar Pradesh. The report identifies Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand as states that will require greater higher education capacity.

Four states — Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand and Nagaland — have a Gross Enrolment Ratio below 20 percent, against the national average of 30 percent. Only Puducherry, Chandigarh, Delhi and Tamil Nadu have crossed the National Education Policy (NEP) target of 50 percent.

The report also finds that 83 percent of education-related migrants remain within their home state, based on Census 2011 data, highlighting the importance of regional access to higher education.

Some higher education clusters have developed outside major cities. Sikar in Rajasthan has 374 colleges, followed by Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh with 338 and Belagavi in Karnataka with 317.

The report notes that 22 universities each oversee more than 500 affiliated colleges, while 96 percent of affiliated colleges are linked to state public universities.

Nearly 13.4 lakh Indian students were studying abroad in 2024, almost twice the number in 2016. In 2022, around 20 Indian students went abroad for every international student studying in India.

“India has already demonstrated that it can build higher education at extraordinary scale. The next test is precision: understanding where future students will be, where capacity is weakest and where new institutions can have the greatest impact on opportunity and regional growth,” said Shreyasi Singh, Founding Managing Partner, Jetri.

Vrunda Bansode, Founder and CEO of Impactica.org, said the focus should now shift from expanding capacity to matching it with demand.

The report recommends developing ecosystems of universities, colleges and regional connectivity rather than isolated campuses, with Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand identified as focus states for the next phase of expansion.

Also Read: JEE Advanced 2026: Women qualification rate highest in six years

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“Most schools never consciously chose their basic unit. They inherited one from the past: the class. With the class as the focus, the things that happen between people get squeezed out: the apprentice learning alongside someone skilled, the child taught where they are rather than where the class is, and the daily practice of getting along with people they did not choose. The most promising new schools are organising themselves around the individual child rather than the class. A better approach is to group children by readiness in each subject and change those groups as they progress. Communication, collaboration and handling disagreement need daily practice. In a school built around individual progress, teachers get time back to observe, diagnose, mentor and step in where they are most needed. Most teachers entered the profession to make a difference to children. Many spend their careers managing classes instead. The best new schools offer them a system that finally lets them do the work they signed up for.”

- Rahul Raghavan, Economic Times, (27/10)

“Government medical college seats are 100% filled, vacancies are confined entirely to the private sector. Colleges and state fee-fixation committees must re-examine these fee structures, because lowering NEET qualifying cut-offs will not resolve an affordability crisis when millions of candidates already qualify. The vacancies are an indicator that qualifying for medical admission does not necessarily mean students could afford a seat. Institutions charge full fees to early applicants and offer discounts to late entrants to fill the vacant seats. It reflects a purely commercial approach that compromises merit while still failing to fill classrooms. High management-quota fees are putting seats beyond the reach of many candidates. Some 24 lakh students write the entrance test for 1.4 lakh seats. While the cream gets government seats, the rest of the students cannot afford a management-quota seat.”

- Divyansh Kumar, The Times of India, (2/11)

28 percent of India’s universities concentrated in 20 districts: report

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