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Institute Ranking

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The University Grants Commission is the statutory body responsible for ensuring, maintaining and promoting the standards of Indian higher education institutions as per the prevailing global educational trends. Institute Ranking plays a fundamental role in building institutional position and receiving authorization from the UGC. The higher education institutes utilize the ranking parameters to bring about strategic and academic changes. Moreover, the international students planning to study in India can effectively use the ranking to assess the education standards of the institute they plan to go to.

Broad Framework For The Categorisation of Universities

The UGC categorises the Indian institutions in broadly three categories:

CATEGORY- I UNIVERSITY

A university is recognised as Category - I if it fulfils one or more of the following parameters:

  • Should have been accredited by NAAC with a score of 3.51 or above;
  • Should have received a corresponding accreditation grade/ score from a reputed accreditation agency chosen by the UGC;
  • Should have been ranked among the top 500 of reputed world rankings, such as Times Higher Education or QS.

CATEGORY - II UNIVERSITY

A university is recognised as Category - II if it fulfils one or more of the following parameters:

  • Should have been accredited by NAAC with a score of 3.26 and above, up to 3.50; or,
  • Should have received a corresponding accreditation grade/score from a reputed accreditation agency chosen by the UGC.

CATEGORY - III UNIVERSITY

A university is recognised as Category-III University if it doesn’t fall under the above two categories.

The Accrediting Organizations

The quality and standard assessment of higher education institutions are overseen primarily by two organizations NAAC and NIRF. A brief detail of both of them can be found below.

About NAAC

The National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) is an autonomous organization set up by University Grants Commission and it is headquartered in Bengaluru. The main function of NAAC is to ensure that quality is the defining feature of higher Study in India. It facilitates performance assessment and inspection for volunteering higher education institutions through a series of parameters. The accreditation granted by NAAC helps the institutions to identify and amend their internal planning areas, resource allocation and weakness through an extensive review procedure. On the other hand, the students get reliable information in terms of quality education offered by the concerned institution.

Assessment Criteria: NAAC evaluates higher education institutions based on seven key criteria. To simplify the evaluation, it categorises institutions into three types: Universities, Autonomous Colleges, and Affiliated Colleges. The major criteria for assessment include:

  • Curricular Aspects
  • Teaching-Learning and Evaluation
  • Research, Innovations and Extension
  • Infrastructure and Learning Resources
  • Student Support and Progression
  • Governance, Leadership and Management
  • Institutional Values and Best Practices

Eligibility Criteria For Institutions: The higher education institutions that either have been in existence for six years or have a record of a minimum of two batches of graduated students can apply for the assessment and accreditation process by NAAC.

About NIRF

The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) is the methodology approved and launched by the Ministry of Education (erstwhile known as Human Resource Development) that outlines the procedure of ranking higher education institutes across India. The methodology revolves around ranking the institutions based on five broad categories which are sub-categorised as well. For the simplified approach, the institutions are grouped as - Category A (Institutions of National Importance, State Universities, Deemed-To-be-Universities, Private Universities and Autonomous institutions) and Category B (Institutions affiliated to a University). Assessment Criteria: NIRF uses five key parameters to rank Indian higher education institutions, which are as follows:

1. Teaching, Learning & Resources

  • Student Strength including doctoral students (SS)
  • Faculty-student ratio with emphasis on permanent faculty (FSR)
  • Combined metric for faculty with PhD and experience (FQE)
  • Financial resources and their utilisation

2. Research and Professional Practice

  • Combined metric for publications (PU)
  • Combined metric for quality of publications (QP)
  • IPR and Patents: Published and Granted
  • The footprint of projects and professional practice

3. Graduation Outcomes

  • Metric for University Examinations
  • Metric for Number of PhD students who graduated

4. Outreach and Inclusivity

  • Percentage of Students from other states/countries
  • Percentage of women
  • Economically and socially challenged students
  • Facilities for physically challenged students
  • Perception Ranking

5. Peer Perception

  • Academic peers and employers