NIRF Ranking 2018: IISc tops list, IIT-Madras best engineering college

IIM-Ahmedabad best management institute; All India Institute of Medical Sciences top medical college

Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, was again ranked first in both overall and university categories.

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) were adjudged the best among engineering and management institutes for the third time in row on the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2018, released by Union Minister of Human Resource Development Prakash Javadekar on Tuesday. While IIT-Madras was adjudged the best engineering institute, IIM-Ahmedabad was adjudged the best management institute.

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences was adjudged the top medical college, a new category added this year. There were a total pf nine categories under which India’s higher education institutions were judged on parameters such as teaching, learning & resources, research and professional practice, graduation outcomes, outreach and inclusivity, and perception. 

The ranking of most colleges and universities have, however, remained almost the same this year. Delhi University’s Miranda House came first among colleges for the second time, while St Stephens and Hindu, which didn’t participate in 2016 and 2017, were ranked second and fourth respectively this year. Presidency College, Kolkata was the biggest gainer at fifth position. It was at the 96th position last year. 

“The government is planning to cut some sort of funding to colleges and universities which don’t participate in the rankings,” R Subrahmanyam, secretary for higher education, said at the event. India has around 864 universities, 40,026 colleges and 11,669 standalone institutions offering higher education in the country. Of these universities and colleges, around 4,500 institutes took part in the India Rankings 2018.

*The figure in brackets represents the ranking for 2017; * NR means not ranked last year

Surendra Prasad, former director, IIT-Delhi, and the man behind the rankings said there were some institutes, which could not be placed in any of the nine categories, have been placed in special category because of the quality of research work. They were National Dairy Research Institute in Karnal, Indian Agricultural Research Institute in New Delhi, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research in Bengaluru, and Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai.

Among the top management institutes, the older IIMs continued their dominance in the ranking. They were followed by IIT-Bombay, a surprise entry at fifth position, IIT-Kharagpur, IIT-Delhi and IIT-Roorkee. The new IIMs at Udaipur, Kashipur and Raipur were ranked 13, 20, and 21 respectively. 

Javadekar used the platform to clarify that those central, state, deemed and private universities, who were given graded autonomy recently, would continue to get government support and funding. The MHRD has recently announced autonomy to 60 institutes of higher education such as Jawaharlal Nehru University, Banaras Hindu University and Aligarh Muslim University, which have maintained a high standard of academic excellence. These don’t require prior permission of the University Grants Commission (UGC) to start a course, fix course fees, set up a new department or open offline campuses.