GATE 2027 Exam Cities: West Bengal Sits in Two Zones
West Bengal is not one GATE zone. Table 1 of the official brochure puts Asansol, Burdwan, Durgapur, Kalyani and Siliguri in the IIT Guwahati zone, and Bankura, Berhampore, Hooghly, Howrah, Kharagpur-Midnapur, Kolaghat, Kolkata and Suri in the IIT Kharagpur zone. Section 6.3 requires all three of your city choices to come from a single zone, so a first choice on one side of that line rules out every city on the other.
Source: GATE 2027 Information Brochure: Table 1 (printed pages 6 and 7), section 6.3 and the Contact Information page.
Updated 22 September 2026 · Valid until 21 October 2026
GATE 2027 examination cities in the two zones that include West Bengal, from Table 1 of the official brochure. The brochure itself calls the list tentative
| Zone | State or UT | Tentative examination cities |
|---|---|---|
| IIT Guwahati | Arunachal Pradesh | Naharlagun, Papum pare |
| IIT Guwahati | Assam | Dibrugarh, Guwahati, Jorhat, Silchar, Tezpur |
| IIT Guwahati | Bihar | Bhagalpur, Muzaffarpur, Patna, Purnea |
| IIT Guwahati | Jharkhand | Bokaro Steel City, Dhanbad |
| IIT Guwahati | Manipur | Imphal, Thoubal |
| IIT Guwahati | Meghalaya | Shillong |
| IIT Guwahati | Mizoram | Aizawl |
| IIT Guwahati | Nagaland | Dimapur - Kohima |
| IIT Guwahati | Sikkim | Gangtok |
| IIT Guwahati | Tripura | Agartala |
| IIT Guwahati | West Bengal | Asansol, Burdwan, Durgapur, Kalyani, Siliguri |
| IIT Kharagpur | Andhra Pradesh | Bhimavaram, Eluru, Kakinada-Surampalem, Rajamahendravaram (Rajahmundry), Srikakulam, Tadepalligudem, Vijayawada, Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram |
| IIT Kharagpur | Chhattisgarh | Bhilai-Durg, Bilaspur, Raipur |
| IIT Kharagpur | Jharkhand | Hazaribagh, Jamshedpur, Ranchi |
| IIT Kharagpur | Odisha | Balasore-Bhadrak, Baripada, Bhubaneswar, Brahmapur, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Rourkela, Sambalpur |
| IIT Kharagpur | West Bengal | Bankura, Berhampore, Hooghly, Howrah, Kharagpur-Midnapur, Kolaghat, Kolkata, Suri |
Source: Table 1 of the official GATE 2027 Information Brochure, printed pages 6 and 7, as on 22 September 2026. The table is a picture in the PDF, not text: a search of all 143 pages for “West Bengal”, “Guwahati” or “Durgapur” returns nothing. These rows are typed out from the two pages. Only the two zones that contain West Bengal are reproduced; the brochure lists eight zones in all, and Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand also appear under other zones not shown here. The brochure's own caption calls this a “tentative list of examination cities”, and section 6.3 on printed page 11 states that the GATE Committee “reserves the right to add a new city or remove an existing one and allot a city that may not be from any of the choices selected by the candidate”.
About this resource
Most pages about GATE examination cities either list every city in India or tell you to check the brochure. Neither helps a candidate in Kolkata, because the question is not which cities exist, it is which three you are allowed to put on one form. Section 6.3, printed page 11, sets the constraint: “A candidate can choose three cities from the list given in Table 1, with the three choices chosen from the same GATE 2027 zone. If a candidate chooses a particular city (in a particular zone) as the first choice, then the second and third choices of the city will also be restricted to the same zone as the first.”
That constraint has a consequence in West Bengal that it does not have in most states, because West Bengal appears under two different zonal institutes. Kolkata, Howrah, Hooghly, Kolaghat, Kharagpur-Midnapur, Bankura, Berhampore and Suri are listed under IIT Kharagpur. Asansol, Burdwan, Durgapur, Kalyani and Siliguri are listed under IIT Guwahati. A candidate in Durgapur who puts their own city first cannot then name Kolkata as a fallback, and a candidate in Kolkata cannot fall back on Durgapur.
The zone is not only about where you sit the paper. Printed page 21 states that “Candidates are assigned a zone at the time of application, based on the first choice of the exam city”, and the zonal institute is the office that answers your queries for the rest of the cycle. Your first choice therefore picks your correspondent as well as your centre.
Two limits travel with this table and neither should be read past. The brochure's own caption calls it a “tentative list of examination cities”. And section 6.3 continues: “Because of operational constraints, the GATE Committee reserves the right to add a new city or remove an existing one and allot a city that may not be from any of the choices selected by the candidate.” Choosing carefully improves your odds; it does not bind anyone. This page reproduces only the two zones that contain West Bengal, the brochure lists eight.
What's included
- ✓Every examination city the brochure lists for the IIT Guwahati and IIT Kharagpur zones
- ✓The West Bengal split, which five cities sit in one zone and which eight in the other
- ✓Section 6.3's rule on three choices from one zone, quoted in full
- ✓What the brochure says the Committee may do regardless of your choices
- ✓Which zonal institute becomes your point of contact, and what decides it
- ✓The date the choice closes, and the date the allotted city is notified
How to use this resource
Find your first-choice city in the table, then read its Zone. Your second and third choices must come from the same Zone column, that is the whole rule.
If you are in or near Kolkata, your zone is IIT Kharagpur and Durgapur, Asansol, Siliguri, Kalyani and Burdwan are not available to you as fallbacks. If you are in Durgapur, Asansol, Siliguri, Kalyani or Burdwan, the reverse applies and Kolkata is out.
Treat the list as tentative, because the brochure does. Section 6.3 reserves the right to allot a city you did not choose, so pick three you could travel to rather than three you would prefer.
The last date to change your examination city is 21 October 2026, and cities are notified in January 2027, both on /resources/gate-2027-application-checklist, which is where the dates are kept current.
Frequently asked questions
Can I choose Kolkata and Durgapur as my first two GATE 2027 choices?+
No. Table 1 puts Kolkata in the IIT Kharagpur zone and Durgapur in the IIT Guwahati zone, and section 6.3 on printed page 11 requires all three choices to come from one zone: “If a candidate chooses a particular city (in a particular zone) as the first choice, then the second and third choices of the city will also be restricted to the same zone as the first.” Choosing either one first rules the other out.
Which GATE zone is Kolkata in?+
IIT Kharagpur. The brochure lists Bankura, Berhampore, Hooghly, Howrah, Kharagpur-Midnapur, Kolaghat, Kolkata and Suri under that zonal institute. Printed page 21 adds that your zone is assigned from your FIRST choice of city, and that zonal office is the one that handles your queries for the rest of the cycle.
Am I guaranteed one of the three cities I choose?+
No, and the brochure says so in the same section that sets the rule. Section 6.3 states that “Because of operational constraints, the GATE Committee reserves the right to add a new city or remove an existing one and allot a city that may not be from any of the choices selected by the candidate.” The table is also labelled a tentative list in its own caption.
Until when can I change my GATE 2027 examination city?+
21 October 2026 is the last date to change the examination city choice, and candidates are notified of their allotted city in January 2027. Those dates live on the GATE 2027 application checklist at /resources/gate-2027-application-checklist, which is the single page kept current for them; this one deliberately carries no other dates.
Why do other websites not show this split?+
Because Table 1 is a picture in the brochure PDF, not text. A search of all 143 pages for “West Bengal”, “Guwahati” or “Durgapur” returns nothing, so anything that copies text from the file gets an empty result. The rows on this page are typed out from printed pages 6 and 7 of the brochure.
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