G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology

G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, also known as Pantnagar University, is the first agricultural university established in Independent India. It was inaugurated by the first Prime Minister of India Jawahar Lal Nehru on 17 November 1960 as the Uttar Pradesh Agricultural University (UPAU) in Pantnagar. Later the name was changed to Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture and Technology in 1972 in memory of the first Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, statesman and Bharat Ratna recipient Govind Ballabh Pant. The university is located in the campus town of Pantnagar in Kichha Tehseel and in the district of Udham Singh Nagar near the famous town of Nainital in the State of Uttarakhand. The university is regarded as the harbinger of the Green Revolution in India.

India’s agriculture industry is a global powerhouse today, employing around 60 percent of the nation’s workforce and contributing to about 20 percent of its GDP. Related to agriculture, India’s energy sector is a rapidly growing industry balancing hydrocarbon fuels like coal, oil, and gas with significant recent capacity additions in sustainable energy sources like solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear, making the country the world's third-largest electricity producer after China and the United States.

Pantnagar University is a prominent centre of excellence in technological innovation and agricultural research in Asia. The prestigious university has produced many successful alumni in diverse fields, particularly agriculture, engineering, technology, politics, and civil services. The alumni network of the university includes Members of the Parliament, Members of the Legislative Assemblies, Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers, Chief Executive Officers of successful technology and business ventures, and Director Generals of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research.

The university is renowned for the success of its alumni in extremely competitive and influential avenues such as the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE), the Combined Defence Services Examination (CDS) and the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) examinations conducted by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), with the Pantnagar alumni frequently securing national ranks in the top ten and several positions among the top hundred successful candidates in the country every year.

G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology has been consistently ranked 1 as the best state agricultural university amongst approximately 70 state agricultural universities of the country at the Foundation Day celebrations of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). The university is also ranked overall 3 including ICAR institutions and state agricultural universities in the country.

The university is notable for having the most number of instructional days per year amongst all universities in India, and also for having one of the best teacher-student ratios (1:6) amongst all premier educational institutions in the country. With a massive campus covering over 12,000 acres near the Himalayas, Pantnagar University is also the largest university in India by area and acreage.