The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2023 was released by the Minister of State for Education and External Affairs Dr. Rajkumar Ranjan Singh on Monday as IIT Madras topped the overall rankings followed by IISc Bangalore in 2nd position and IIT Delhi in third position.
The rankings, which were first issued in 2016, were ranked on parameters such as teaching learning and resources, research and professional practice, graduation outcome, outreach and inclusivity, and perception.
While prominent IITs made it to the list, other central and public institutions also made their mark in the overall category. IIT Bombay, which bagged the fourth position, was followed by IIT Kanpur (5), IIT Kharagpur (7), IIT Roorkee (8), IIT Guwahati (9), while AIIMS, New Delhi, and Jawaharlal Nehru University stood at 6th and 10th positions respectively.
IIT Bombay Director hails institute's performance
Hailing IIT Bombay’s performance, which has been ranked 3rd in Engineering, 10th in Management, 4th in Research, and 7th in the newly-added category ‘Innovation’, Director Prof. Subhasis Chaudhuri said, "IIT Bombay always strives hard to provide the best possible educational experience to its students and faculty members, and our performance in various ranking exercises like QS and NIRF is a result of that endeavour."
IIT Delhi's research ecosystem contributed to institute's success
Similarly, IIT Delhi, which retained its second rank in the Engineering category and figures among the top three for Research, owed its performance to the institute’s ‘ecosystem of teachers and students.’
“The research contributions made by IIT Delhi faculty and researchers have played a key role in the rankings of the institute. IIT Delhi has also been consistently doing very well in terms of innovative teaching methodology. The institute has built a research ecosystem so that faculty and students can excel in research. The start-up and innovative culture on campus put our students ahead of their peers,” said Prof P.V. Rao, Dean, Planning, and Head Rankings Cell, IIT Delhi.
State, deemed to be universities make their mark
The increasing number of state and deemed to be universities were also highlighted by UGC Chairman Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar.
“Though institutions of national importance continue to maintain a major presence, it can be seen that state universities have come up well followed by deemed to be universities. This signals the potential of state universities in India. Considering that the total number of central universities is still small, they also have a good presence in the top 100 list. As most of the private universities in India have come up in the last decade, their pace of growth in terms of quality may take further time,” said Kumar.
Despite the rankings signalling the potential of publicly funded institutions in India especially in innovation and research, academicians believe it NIRF’s projections fall short of showcasing the complete picture.
No merit in rankings in its current state, believes professor
“Most colleges are now losing out on facilities and quality manpower at graduate and research, including in IITs. Earlier there used to be so much effort in publishing even one research paper, but now the publication parameters have been diluted. Every institute should create their mandate rather than the rankings clubbing them all together,” asserted an IIT Bombay professor, who didn’t wish to be named.
IIMs take the Management mantle in NIRF Rankings
Apart from Engineering, the lucrative Management category saw IIMs take the top spots. The Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Ahmedabad came out on top in the category, followed by the IIMs in Bengaluru and Kozhikode. Additionally, IIT-Delhi and IIT-Bombay made the top 10 in the management category.
According to the official release by NIRF, the framework, methodology, and metrics used for ranking of HEIs for India Rankings in its previous edition were continued for the current year without any major changes. With the expansion of the scope of “Architecture” to “Architecture and Planning”, programs and faculty about Planning (in addition to Architecture) are being considered for the ranking of HEIs in this subject domain.
