The Indian Institute of Science has emerged India’s best university for engineering as per the 2018 Times Higher Education World University Ranking. But their global ranking fell to the 251-300 category, a decline in research income and research influence score were cited for the same.
IIT Delhi and IIT Kanpur, fell short of the previous year’s position of the 401- 500 club to 501-600 band. IIT Bombay retained its 2017 in the 351-400 category, as did IIT Kharagpur and IIT Roorkee in the 501-600 bracket. Phil Baty, editorial director of global rankings of THE said, “It is disappointing that India has declined in THE World University Rankings amid increasing global competition. As leading universities in other Asian territories such as China, Hong Kong and Singapore are consistently rising up the rankings, in part thanks to high and sustained levels of funding, India’s flagship the Indian Institute of Science moves further away from the elite top 200”.
One of the major reasons for India’s university rankings taking a plunge can be attributed to internationalization, which refers to a university’s ability in attracting foreign staff and students.
According to LiveMint, even though India has put plans to bring in foreign universities on hold, the government, in August, cleared a proposal to establish 20 world class institutions by relaxing regulatory norms and pumping in extra funds. Once in place, this is expected to bring in more foreign students and faculties to India and may help raise the profile of its universities.
Overall, 1,000 universities from 77 countries were ranked by the THE. The University of Oxford maintained first place in the rankings, followed by The University of Cambridge. California Institute of Technology and Stanford University shared third place while Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) closed off the top five chart.
