List of Indian engineering colleges before Independence

The impulse for creation of centers of technical training came from the British rulers of India, and it arose out of the necessity for the training of overseers for construction and maintenance of public buildings, roads, canals, and ports, and for the training of artisans and craftsmen for the use of instruments, and apparatus needed for the army, the navy, and the survey department.While superintending engineers were mostly recruited from Britain, lower grades-craftsmen, artisans and sub-overseers who were recruited locally. The necessity to make them more efficient, led to the establishment of industrial schools attached to the Indian Ordnance Factories and other engineering establishments. The first such industrial school was established at Guindy, Madras, in 1794, attached to the Gun Carriage Factory. This industrial school became ultimately the Guindy College of Engineering (College of Engineering, Guindy) and affiliated to the Madras University in 1858.

The first engineering college was established in the U.P. in 1847 for the training of Civil Engineers at Roorkee, Thomason College (which later become IIT Roorkee), which made use of the large workshops and public buildings there that were erected for the Upper Ganges Canal.In pursuance of the Government policy, three Engineering Colleges were opened by about 1856 in the three Presidencies. In Bengal, a College called the Calcutta College of Civil Engineering was opened at the Writers' Buildings in November 1856.In Bombay,the overseers' school at Pune eventually became the Pune College of Engineering and affiliated to the Bombay University in 1858.In the Madras Presidency, the industrial school attached to the Gun Carriage Factory became ultimately the Guindy College of Engineering and affiliated to the Madras University (1858). British opened Harcourt Butler Technological Institute, Kanpur for chemical sciences in 1921 in then United Provinces, now Uttar Pradesh. Indian School Of Mines, Dhanbad was established by British Indian Government on the lines of the Royal School of Mines - London, and was formally opened on 9 December 1926 by Lord Irwin, the then Viceroy of India.The PEC University of Technology, Chandigarh was originally established as Mugalpura Engineering College at Lahore (now in Pakistan) on November 9, 1921. The name of the college was later changed to Maclagan Engineering College on March 19, 1924.^[1]

In 1947 when India became independent, there were 36 institutions for first-degree engineering education, with an annual intake of about 2500 students.^[2]

^A Raised to degree standard (college/university).

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