E-Paper
NIRF 2023 Rankings: Pune varsity slips to 35th rank
The ranking was announced by the education minister Rajkumar Ranjan Singh based on the performance of the universities
The Savitribai Phule Pune University’s (SPPU) rank dropped to 35 (overall category) in the country in the National Institute Ranking Framework (NIRF) for 2023 announced by the Union Ministry of Education on Monday. SPPU ranked 25th last year in the NIRF ranking. Similarly, other prominent institutions from Pune like COEP Technical University and Symbiosis International University (SIU) have also performed poorly.
SPPU’s ranking has seen a drop in the overall ranking list in the last three years. The university ranked 12th in the 2020 ranking while it was ranked 11th in 2021 and then dropped to 25th in 2022, this year it further dropped to 35th rank. The University this year received a 55.78 % score in the overall performance.
In the university category, SPPU dropped to 19th rank this year as opposed to the 12th rank it achieved in 2022. In 2021 it ranked 11th. The fall of the university which ranked 9th in the top ten university group in 2020 is a cause of concern, although it is still ranked number one among public universities in Maharashtra.
The ranking was announced by the education minister Rajkumar Ranjan Singh based on the performance of the universities. NIRF was started in 2016 and only around 3,500 educational institutions participated in the first year. This year, the number has gone up to 8,686. In the country, the Indian Institute of Madras bagged the top spot.
Evaluation
In the NIRF Rankings, the country’s educational institutes are divided in 12 groups. Further, the institutes are given the rank based on the following criteria- Research, inclusiveness, graduate student outcomes and numbers, teaching, learning and resources.
How city universities fared
In its assessment, SPPU secured 0 out of 15. It also scored 1 out of 20 in the number of economically and socially needy students criteria.
The continuous decline the SPPU’s ranking in the past three years has raised a question mark regarding the overall functioning of the university.
SPPU vice-chancellor Prof Karbhari Kale said, “I will not call this as a decline in ranking for SPPU as still our university is the top university in the state. In the last two years, several senior professors from SPPU retired due to which the student-teacher ratio was impacted. A major concern is the public perception about the university. So, we have maintained status quo and we will certainly improve next year.”
In the engineering category, the College of Engineering Pune (COEP) Technical University ranked 73rd among the top engineering institutions in the country with a total score of 46.89%.
A statement issued by COEP stated, “Since the number of participating institutes are increasing, inspite of the rise in marks in almost all the parameters (as compared to the previous year’s marks) COEP’s ranking has descended by one position this year (it was ranked 72nd with a total score of 44.38 last year). However, we are the only ‘state funded’ Institution from Maharashtra to make it in the list of Top 100 institutions, competing with all other institutions which are either the Centrally funded IITs, NITs, universities or institutes of eminence and are ranked higher than COEP in the current list.”
“Overall, COEP has scored better than the previous year in parameters like teaching, learning & resources, graduation outcomes, outreach &inclusivity, however, it dropped scores in peer perception. We severely lag on research and professional practice and perception, which has affected our overall score on the negative side. Lack of sufficient number of full-time PhD scholars, and a greater number of contractual faculty unable to fetch research grants, could also be the reason for the observed trend,” said Prof Sudhir Agashe, vice-chancellor, COEP Technological University.
In the other categories, most of the institutions have reported a poor performance. In the college category Fergusson College (Autonomous) ranked 79th this year as compared to its 57th in rank last year. While Dr D Y Patil Vidyapeeth has also slipped down in the university category from last year’s 41st rank to this year’s 46th rank. Indian Institute of Science Education & Research (IISER) Pune ranked 34th this year as compared to its 26th rank last year.
