The Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University Rankings are out!
The Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences for Dentistry secured the 18th position and is India’s highest-ranked university on the list and the new entrant Indian School of Mines (ISM) University, Dhanbad secured the second-highest rank among Indian educational institutes.
Not only the universities, but even six programmes which are being offered by India’s Institute of Eminence (loEs) have also managed to secure a place in top 100 of the QS Rankings by Subject which was released on Wednesday, April 6, as per a report in PTI.
The London-based QS shared that post the four-and-a-half-year mark of IoE's inception, the varsities have gained moderate ground on the global stage.
Among the eight declared public loEs, only four have increased their representation among the global top 100 but two programmes have fallen out of the top 100 on the basis of their academic discipline over the last year.
When compared to the 2021 edition of tables, 10 additional Indian programmes have achieved the top 100 positions which takes the total to 35.
Among the top 100, the five public loEs to feature are the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), which moved up from 113 to 98 in Mechanical Engineering and 91, up from 112, in Physics and Astronomy; Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) which ranks in the range of 51-100 for Civil and Structural Engineering, it was previously in the 101-150 band; IIT Delhi ranks 92 for Chemical Engineering, up from the previous 101-150 range and IIT Bombay secured the 99th position in Materials Science, up from the previous 101-150 range.
The OP Jindal Global University, which is also an loE, has secured the 70th position for Law.
The Education Ministry in the year 2018 declared the top institutes in India, along with the public and private sectors, as loEs.
Under the loE schemes, public institutes received funds from the government to develop their research infrastructure and faculty whereas the private institutes were given freedom from regulators in order to lift these institutes into the world rankings
"One of the biggest challenges faced by India is educational — providing high-quality tertiary education in the face of exploding demand: this much was recognised by 2020's NEP, which set the ambitious target of a 50 per cent gross enrollment ratio by 2035," said Ben Sowter, QS research director, as per a report in PTI.
"It should therefore provide some reassurance that the number of Indian programmes featuring across our 51 subject rankings has increased this year — from 233 to 274 — where it had been decreasing previously," Sowter said.
"However, QS also notes that several programmes at India's privately-run IoE have made progress this year, demonstrating the positive role that well-regulated private provision can have in enhancing India's higher education sector," he added.
The rankings also provide an independent comparative analysis given by the global higher education analysts, on the basis of the performance of 15,200 individual university programmes which are actively taken by the students at 1,543 universities which are found at 88 locations in the world across the 51 academic disciplines and five broad faulty areas.
They were considered to be a part of the annual QS World University Rankings portfolio. The portfolio was consulted over 147 million times in 2021 whereas the media and institutions covered it 96,000 times.
IIT Madras secured the 30th rank for Petroleum Engineering among the four loEs in the top 50 ranks and is considered to be India’s highest-ranking public loE.
Apart from Physics, Astronomy and Mechanical Engineering, the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) secured 76th rank in Material Science and 81st rank in Chemistry thereby, breaking into the top 100 in Physics.
The University of Delhi secures 41st rank for development studies.
Among the 14 subject tables, which include the top 100 positions in Civil and Structural Engineering, Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering were the tables IIT Delhi ranked in.
IIM Bangalore and IIM Ahmedabad achieved top 100 ranks in business and management while the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER), Mohali which is considered to be India's most improved entry in Pharmacy and Pharmacology, rose over 100 places in this year's rankings.
The University of Hyderabad (UoH)'s Department of English is in the 301-320 band of ranks and what's more? It remains the top-ranked subject in UoH for the second year, back-to-back. Chemistry is within the 401-450 ranks, Life Sciences within 551-600 and Physics within 601-610.
Also, UoH is featured in 36 out of 51 narrow subjects.
Public IoE remains significantly better-represented in the rankings than private ones.
Shiv Nadar University was one of the four private universities which was already declared as loE made an exception by not appearing in the subject rankings.
According to the QS, India is considered to stand at the forefront of global environmental science research. India ranked 5th on the basis of research footprint in this field according to the data from QS’s research partners at Elsevier. India falls behind Germany, China, the United Kingdom and the United States in environmental science research.
In the 2022 QS’s Environmental Sciences Rankings, among the eight Indian universities which are featured are IIT Bombay, securing a place in the top 150 whereas IIT Kharagpur was considered to be stable in the 151-200 band.
Banaras Hindu University which secures a place in the 401-450 range and Anna University secures a place in the 451- 460 range in the rankings are considered to be the new entities in this discipline.
