After the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) was approved by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, the states are planning to come up with their own university rankings.
A source in the ministry has confirmed that they are encouraging more states to come up with their own rankings. Karnataka has already taken the lead, with the state announcing its first state-wide university rankings. Maharashtra and Haryana are the other two states that are actively discussing the same.
Karnataka State Higher Education Council (KSHEC), in March, released the inaugural edition of the Karnataka State Universities Rating Framework (KSURF), which is a detailed audit and evaluation of all the state, private and deemed universities in the state.
In the established universities category, Gulbarga University was rated at the top for research productivity, Bangalore University for research citations and KLE University for industrial memorandum of understandings.
The KSHEC would annually rate universities under regionally-relevant yet globally-flavoured parameters such as research excellence, innovation, teaching excellence, employability, infrastructure, inclusiveness and social impact.
"Education being a state subject, states also need to do their bit to improve quality of higher education. We have some very good state universities, but right now they are not energised enough because of lack of funding. The rankings will not only help students, it will give an idea to the state governments as to which universities can excel with funding", said Karthick Sridhar, vice chairman of ICARE, a company that helps universities and colleges participate in rankings.
NIRF rankings began in 2015 to adjudge universities and colleges on various parameters. This year's rankings came in April wherein Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru topped the 'overall' and 'universities' category. Delhi University's Miranda House was declared the best college in the country.
HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar had then made it clear that educational institutions performing well in the annual ranking will be awarded with more funding or grants, enhanced autonomy and freedom of functioning and various other benefits.
Sridhar said NIRF has brought a great deal of competition among colleges. The next step for it would be to have category wise segregated rankings—for instance, best college for biotechnology or mechanical engineering.
