DU UG admission preferences shift : Dyal Singh, Sri Venkateswara among top 6 choices

5 min readNew DelhiJul 13, 2026 10:23 AM IST

This year, the most preferred colleges also include Kirori Mal College and Hansraj College, followed by Hindu College, Sri Venkateswara College, Ramjas College and Dyal Singh College.

The undergraduate (UG) admission process at Delhi University (DU) this year has witnessed a reshuffle in college preferences opted by candidates — with Dyal Singh College breaking into the list of the six most preferred colleges, and traditional frontrunners, including Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), St Stephen’s College and Miranda House not making it to the top five, The Indian Express has learnt.

However, university officials cautioned against drawing definitive conclusions at this stage, saying the admission process is still underway. They also attributed the emerging trend partly to differences in seat capacity across colleges.

“For instance, Dyal Singh College has about 800 more seats than St Stephen’s College. That is probably one of the reasons we are seeing some of the traditional colleges moving out of the top preferred list this year,” a senior university official told The Indian Express.

“Although it is too early to conclusively analyse why this change is happening, we believe seat availability could be an important factor,” the official said.

Preferences submitted by candidates until 5.30 pm on Sunday evening suggest that the hierarchy of DU’s most sought-after colleges continues to evolve under the Common Seat Allocation System (CSAS), since the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) was introduced in 2022, with this year’s student preferences differing markedly from those seen in the previous year’s admission cycle.

This year, the most preferred colleges also include Kirori Mal College and Hansraj College, followed by Hindu College, Sri Venkateswara College, Ramjas College and Dyal Singh College.

The changing preferences become evident when viewed across the CUET era. In the first year of CUET admissions in 2022, Ramjas College, Kirori Mal College, Sri Venkateswara College, Delhi College of Arts and Commerce, Hansraj College and SRCC featured among the most preferred colleges.

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In 2023, Kirori Mal emerged as the most preferred college, followed by Hindu and Hansraj. In 2025, again, the order was different, as SRCC topped the chart and Hindu College, Hansraj College, St Stephen’s College and Miranda House followed.

This year, however, Kirori Mal is back at the top. Sri Venkateswara, Ramjas and Dyal Singh are on the top spots, replacing SRCC, St Stephen’s and Miranda House.

The trend also reflects the changing dynamics of admissions under CSAS. Unlike the earlier cut-off based system, candidates now submit a comprehensive order of programme and college preferences after their CUET scores are declared. This allows them to factor in not only the reputation of colleges, but also seat availability, previous admission trends and the likelihood of securing admission. Even as students appear to be reassessing their choice of colleges, their preferred programmes have remained remarkably consistent.

Commerce courses continue to dominate admissions five years into the CUET era. University data shows B.Com (Honours) and B.Com remain the two most sought-after programmes this year, followed by BA (Honours) English, BA (Honours) Political Science, the BA Programme combination of History and Political Science, BA (Honours) History and B.Sc. (Honours) Zoology.

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The pattern broadly mirrors last year’s admissions. In 2025, B.Com (Honours) received 19.90 lakh programme preferences, followed by B.Com with 15.26 lakh and BA (Honours) English with 12.23 lakh. Among BA Programme combinations, History and Political Science attracted the highest number of preferences, followed by Economics and Political Science and English and Economics. In terms of first-choice selections, B.Com (Honours) remained the most preferred programme with 48,336 first preferences, followed by BA (Honours) Political Science and B.Sc. (Honours) Zoology.

As of Sunday evening, 2,73,751 candidates had signed up on the CSAS portal, of whom 2,18,284 completed their registrations. More than 2.06 lakh applicants had submitted their programme and college preferences.

Women continue to outnumber men in the admissions process. Of the candidates who completed registration, 1,20,509 are women and 97,775 men, continuing the trend seen last year when women constituted just over 53% of applicants.

Competition remains intense, with over two lakh vying for around 71,600 UG seats across 73 programmes offered by 69 colleges and academic departments. In addition, the university is offering nearly 150 combinations under the BA Programme.

The university was scheduled to release simulated ranks by 5 pm on Sunday, allowing applicants to assess their likely position before seat allocation. Candidates can revise their programme and college preferences until 4.59 pm on July 13.

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The first CSAS allocation list will be announced on July 16, after which successful candidates will have to accept their allotted seats by July 18. Colleges will complete verification by July 20, while the last date for fee payment in the first round is July 21. The second allocation list is scheduled to be released on July 25.

© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd

Vidheesha Kuntamalla is a Senior Correspondent at The Indian Express, based in New Delhi. She is known for her investigative reporting on higher education policy, international student immigration, and academic freedom on university campuses. Her work consistently connects policy decisions with lived realities, foregrounding how administrative actions, political pressure, and global shifts affect students, faculty, and institutions.

Professional Profile

Core Beat: Vidheesha covers education in Delhi and nationally, reporting on major public institutions including the University of Delhi (DU), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Jamia Millia Islamia, the IITs, and the IIMs. She also reports extensively on private and government schools in the National Capital Region.

Prior to joining The Indian Express, she worked as a freelance journalist in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh for over a year, covering politics, rural issues, women-centric issues, and social justice.

Specialisation: She has developed a strong niche in reporting on the Indian student diaspora, particularly the challenges faced by Indian students and H-1B holders in the United States. Her work examines how geopolitical shifts, immigration policy changes, and campus politics impact global education mobility.

She has also reported widely on:

* Mental health crises and student suicides at IITs

* Policy responses to campus mental health

* Academic freedom and institutional clampdowns at JNU, South Asian University (SAU), and Delhi University

* Curriculum and syllabus changes under the National Education Policy

Her recent reporting has included deeply reported human stories on policy changes during the Trump administration and their consequences for Indian students and researchers in the US.

Reporting Style

Vidheesha is recognised for a human-centric approach to policy reporting, combining investigative depth with intimate storytelling. Her work often highlights the anxieties of students and faculty navigating bureaucratic uncertainty, legal precarity, and institutional pressure. She regularly works with court records, internal documents, official data, and disciplinary frameworks to expose structural challenges to academic freedom.

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An Indian Express investigation found that since 2011, JNU has appeared in over 600 cases before the Delhi High Court, filed by the administration, faculty, staff, students, and contractual workers across the tenures of three Vice-Chancellors.

JNU’s legal wars with students and faculty pile up under 3 V-Cs | Rs 30-lakh fines chill campus dissent (November 2025)

The report traced how steep monetary penalties — now codified in the Chief Proctor’s Office Manual — are reshaping dissent and disciplinary action on campus.

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