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Times World Rankings: Panjab University betters score, enters 601-800 bracket
Panjab University was placed in the 601-800 bracket along with top Indian universities like Aligarh Muslim University and Banaras Hindu University in Uttar Pradesh, Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) Patna and Guwahati, and Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi
Ranked in the 801-1000 bracket globally last year, Panjab University (PU) has improved its ranking by entering the 601-800 bracket in the 2024 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, released on Wednesday.
Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, emerged on the top among the Indian varsities. It was followed by Anna University, Jamia Millia Islamia, Mahatma Gandhi University, and Shoolini University of Biotechnology and Management Sciences. All these universities fall within the 501-600 band.
The University of Oxford, located in the United Kingdom, once again secured the top position in the rankings for the eighth consecutive year. No Indian institution has featured among the Top 250 varsities so far.
Panjab University was placed in the 601-800 bracket along with top Indian universities like Aligarh Muslim University and Banaras Hindu University in Uttar Pradesh, Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) Patna and Guwahati, and Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi.
The varsity outperformed Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune, University of Delhi and IIT Gandhinagar, among others, which have been placed in the 801-1000 bracket.
PU’s overall score saw a big jump, rising to 37.0-41.8 bracket from 29.8 to 33.9 bracket last year. It is also higher than 2021’s overall score, when it was placed in the 32.0 to 37.9 bracket and 2021 when it was 30.2 to 36.3.
In 2013, PU was on the top spot in the country, leaving behind all technical and non-technical institutes. In 2014, the university was placed in the 226-250 bracket, but slipped to 276-300 in 2015. It further dropped to 501-600 bracket in 2016 and was ranked in the 601-800 bracket from 2017 till 2022, before further sliding to 800 to 1000 bracket in the 2023 rankings.
Improvement across all parameters
PU bettered its score in all five parameters, with most significant improvement in the research quality criteria, where its score went up from 60 in 2023 (when the criteria was called citations) to 67.9 in 2024. In 2022 it was 52.6.
The varsity’s score in teaching also improved from 30.5 to 32.6. However, in 2022 the university had scored 32.9 in this parameter.
Industry score improved from 37.5 to 39.2 and that in international outlook rose from 17.1 to 23.5. PU had scored 14.6 in research in 2023, while in the criteria, which has been renamed research environment this year, the varsity scored 16.2.
PU focusing on its shortcomings: V-C
Speaking about the rankings, PU vice-chancellor (VC) Renu Vig said, “We are happy that the university has started improving in rankings and this is because we are now focusing on our shortcomings. Even on Wednesday, we held a meeting to focus on our National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) score and while we have achieved the highest A++ grade, we can further improve the score.”
Vig described that the university had not been lacking as such in the past, but had been selling itself short by not maintaining data properly. Citing an example, she said around 500 PhD degrees were awarded each year, but when the data was collected, the number was listed as around 300 due to technical reasons, which affected the varsity’s scores.
When asked about the shortcomings, especially related to the international outlook criteria, in which across various rankings PU has scored poorly, Vig said the university was working on attracting more international students and bringing in more international faculty to the campus. She said the NAAC field visit team had also urged them to focus on taking PU to the international level in their recent visit.
