The Department of Sociology is the biggest teaching and research centre in South India. Sociology was introduced as an optional subject at the under-graduate level in 1928. The Department was separated from the Department of Economics in 1937-38. In 1946, it introduced the M.A. Course and become a full-fledged Post-Graduate Department. The M.Phil programme was started in 1974 followed by the Doctoral Programme.

The Department was sanctioned 'Special Assistance Programme' (SAP) by UGC in 1990 and was given an extension for the second term during 1995-2000. Later on UGC-Special Assistance Programme was further extended thrice from 2002-2007, 2008-2013 and 2013 to 2018. The trust area of the present Phase of the UGC-Special Assistance Programme is Rural, Urban and Tribal Development.

The Department has also been sanctioned ASIHSS Programme by the UGC, New Delhi from 1st April, 2006 to 2011.

The faculty members of the Department of Sociology carried-out their research work in the fields of Rural Development, Agrarian Structure and Agrarian Relations, Women Studies, Tribal Issues, Tribal Development and Tribal Welfare, Urban Ecology, Social Deviance etc. The Department of Sociology regularly undertake the out-reach programmes. Post-Graduate students and some interested research scholars are generally taken to the villages and the entire village is studied by using Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) techniques. Such kind of field studies provide a great insight to the students in general and foreign students in particular. As part of the curriculum, the Department of Sociology is also having practicals, in which the students are supposed to collect the data from the field and on the basis of that they are supposed to submit a project report.

The faculty members of the Department of Sociology are very much engaged in research work and so far they have completed the research projects sponsored by UGC, New Delhi, ICSSR, New Delhi, NTPC and UNICEF etc.