An important milestone in the history of the college is the grant of academic autonomy to the college by the University Grants Commission. A UGC committee visited the college in 2004 and after going through the past achievements and present potential of the college, recommended the college to be declared an Autonomous institution with effect from 2005-06. However, the college decided to implement autonomy with effect from 2006-2007.

Under autonomy the college is free to have its own academic calendar and programmes. Each department will have its own syllabus, ratified by the Board of Studies consisting of University nominees, Subject specialists from, the institutions of fame and members from high profile corporate sector. The college conducts the examinations as per the well-established norms. The college will publish the results and any discrepancies will be attended to by the college administration. The college will issue marks cards. However, the Bangalore University, based on the recommendatios of the college, will award the Degree certificates. The  University Grants Commission has granted only academic autonomy and not the financial or administrative autonomy.

Functioning as and Autonomous Educational Institution is a big challenge as well as an opportunity to us in our untiring efforts to deliver the ‘best’ to the student community. Accordingly, we are equipped with the best infrastructure and the most advanced syllabi for all the disciplines. Educationists and Scientists of international repute are guiding our academic activities. Vastly experienced and dedicated teaching staff,
computerized library and state-of-art laboratory facilities have been our main strength. We have well represented Botany and Zoology Museums. Keeping in mind the contemporary requirements, we are introducing additional subjects like Communicative English, Computer Basics, and Human Resources Management. The Industry-Institution linkage for interaction, training and placement centres are well within the reach of every student. To facilitate the all-round development of the student, encouragement is given to co-curricular and extra-curricular activities. The Bangalore Science Forum and The Bangalore Social Sciences Forum are the two fora housed in our college which enable the students to procure latest knowledge in the fields of Science and Social Science. We are extremely happy with our experience of functioning as an autonomous college for the last five years. Having upgraded oursyllabi to meet an all- round development of our students, we feel proud to state that it has been quite a momentous beginning for us. We conducted all the tests, examinations as per schedule. A distinct feature has been the distribution of marks cards on the day of the announcement  of results. In consultation with the Industry leaders and the reputed academicians, we have been making our syllabus further relevant. It has been to our credit that IT companies like Infosys, HP, TCS, SAP Labs come to our college and recruit many of our students. The unique feature of the college is that it is managed by the National Education Society of Karnataka, which is built on the Democratic Principles. Further, we have taken a step ahead by introducing B.Com course and a Post-Graduate course in Kannada and M.Sc. in Computer Science from the academic year 2010-11. The National Degree College, Bagepalli, being an autonomous institution is the right place for the generation ‘next’.

To give importance to co-curricular activities as it does to academic excellence has been one of the concerns of the college.  A description of a few activities of the college will reveal to the discerning reader in what sense is the college — a college with a difference and value based that matters.

The academic excellence being taken care of, it was imperative for the concerned to construct the character among the youth. This programme of building character called for an able leadership, much more than hundred percent dedication and commitment on the part of teachers. In this endeavour, the National College Bagepalli, had this, and much more in the form of co-operative students who came with different levels of competence in various fields without losing that essential element of mischief that goes with adolescence.

To build the nationalistic spirit and character among the students, the college formed The Gandhi Study Circle with its varied activities. The foremost among them being ‘the intensive study of national literature.’  Probably it is one of the very few colleges in the state, which has a huge collection of national literature. In addition to many activities such as ‘Shramadana’ the college has the practice of lending books on national literature to students along with questions during the summer vacation. The students write essays on the topics given which are submitted after the reopening of the college. The deserving essays are awarded prizes. The objective of all this activity is to enable the students to be influenced by the great personalities and to build a character for themselves along those lines, which would be worthy of emulation.

The college is ‘value based’ in the sense that it is not concerned with churning out youngsters with university degree alone. The serious minded educationists in this college are inspired by the philosophy of Socrates that education is not a matter of filling up of a vessel with information, but it is a matter of enkindling the mind of the youth. Hence, the college is keenly concerned with the mission of keeping the young minds alive by conducting various activities, which would enkindle the young mind.

The Bangalore Science Forum, an integral part of the institution has been working in this direction for many years. J.B.S.Haldane is known to have once remarked, “the world will not perish for want of wonders but it will perish for want of wonder”. Therefore, the main agenda of the Bangalore Science Forum has always been to keep alive a sense of wonder, a spirit of enquiry, a spirit of curiosity, among the youth burning all the time. It is quite creditable that this Bangalore Science Forum has conducted 1900 lectures and screened 550 films on Science subjects and has bagged the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for popularizing Science.

Our beloved President Dr. H. Narasimhaiah, though a Nuclear Physicist, founded the Bangalore Social Sciences Forum in 1991. He has always recognized the importance of Social Sciences and Humanities as they are very close to life. In this forum series of lectures are delivered by experts to make the students realize the social problems.

The ‘Seva Sangha’ which was thought of by the college much before the UGC, conducted month long camps in rural areas, which were attended by both boys and girls. This programme was completely financed by the college itself and not funded either by the Government or any other external agency.

One more programme that deserves special mention is the programme on health and hygiene. In this programme, the college arranged a series of lectures and counselling for both boys and girls separately. These lectures and counselling dealt with the sensitive problems of adolescent boys and girls. Many parents expressed their wholehearted appreciation of the programme to the Principal for having deftly handled such sensitive problems of the youth, which they would have felt uncomfortable to deal with. The tricky situation was that these boys and girls felt embarrassed to discuss their private problems with their parents. Hence, this programme was very useful to them.

The college introduced Inter-section drama contest in 1962 to develop an all-round personality and social awareness among the youth. Many actors, theatre and film directors who have emerged from the Histrionic Club of the college and inter-section Drama Contests have made remarkable contribution to the revolution of theatre art in Karnataka. In the field of sports, international cricketers like E.A.S. Prasanna, B.S.Chandrasekhar, Anil Kumble and Ekalavya award winner Divya Ramesh have walked through the portals of this college.

One of the outstanding practices tried out in our college is conducting class examinations without invigilators. Dr. H.Narasimhaiah, the former Principal of the college, while in USA as a visiting professor, watched a television interview of an American professor. The interviewer asked the professor as to what in his opinion was the greatness of America. Prompt came the reply from the professor that the greatness of America was that the Americans worked without being supervised by anybody. Being impressed with this element of integrity among the Americans, Dr.H.Narasimhaiah on his return to the college as the Principal decided to conduct examinations without invigilators. When he suggested this novel idea to the teachers of the college, they all fully supported him because they believed that, to keep an eye on students is to suspect their honesty. The teachers informed the students well in advance of the novel scheme which really appealed to their moral fiber. It might come as a surprise to many that the scheme was a great success, though a minority of students did copy in the examination – and cheated themselves in the process. After Dr. Narasimhaiah’s demise, the institution is guided by Dr. A.H. Rama Rao, the present President of N.E.S. of Karnataka.

It is only natural that a college that appeals to the moral fiber in an individual– and that believes in giving education for life ought to make a difference to the world outside.