The release of the latest QS World University Rankings has once again generated excitement across India's higher education sector. India now has 52 institutions represented in the rankings, compared to just 14 a decade ago, making it one of the fastest growing higher education systems in terms of global visibility. Indian universities have also improved their performance in areas such as research impact, employer reputation and international research collaboration. These developments deserve recognition and reflect the hard work of faculty members, students, researchers, administrators and institutional leaders across the country.
Yet rankings should do more than provide a reason to celebrate. They should encourage us to ask a deeper question. What does it actually take to build a university that remains globally respected not for a few years, but for generations? The answer lies far beyond any ranking table. Rankings are useful indicators of progress, but they are not measures of institutional greatness. Most ranking systems place significant emphasis on reputation surveys, research publications, citations and internationalization. These are undoubtedly important indicators, but they capture only part of the university mission. The quality of undergraduate education, contribution to national development, technology transfer, entrepreneurship, social mobility, public service and institution building are much harder to quantify and therefore receive less attention. Rankings do provide useful benchmarks, but they must be interpreted with caution. They are dashboards, not destinations. The danger lies in assuming that improvements in rankings can themselves become a strategy for building great universities.
At the same time, rankings do reveal one important truth. Institutions that improve steadily over long periods almost always possess continuity of purpose. Their success is rarely the result of a single visionary leader, a sudden increase in funding or a short term initiative. Rather, it reflects the cumulative efforts of successive generations of faculty, students, alumni, administrators and institutional leaders working towards a broadly shared vision. This is perhaps the most underappreciated aspect of university building.
{{/usCountry}}At the same time, rankings do reveal one important truth. Institutions that improve steadily over long periods almost always possess continuity of purpose. Their success is rarely the result of a single visionary leader, a sudden increase in funding or a short term initiative. Rather, it reflects the cumulative efforts of successive generations of faculty, students, alumni, administrators and institutional leaders working towards a broadly shared vision. This is perhaps the most underappreciated aspect of university building.
{{/usCountry}}Universities are unlike most organizations. Building a globally respected research ecosystem takes decades. Creating strong doctoral programmes, attracting outstanding faculty, establishing world class laboratories, developing alumni networks and nurturing international partnerships all require sustained effort over long periods of time. Institutional reputation accumulates slowly and cannot be manufactured through publicity campaigns. The timelines involved are measured not in years but in decades. Leadership tenures, however, are inevitably much shorter. This creates a fundamental challenge. How does an institution preserve continuity while allowing leadership renewal and fresh thinking?
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The world's most successful universities have addressed this challenge through a combination of autonomy, strong governance and institutional maturity. Their success does not rest on the assumption that every leader will be extraordinary. Instead, they have built systems that enable institutions to continue moving forward regardless of who occupies the leadership position at a particular point in time. New leaders bring energy, ideas and different perspectives, but they operate within an institutional framework that preserves long term priorities while encouraging innovation.
Autonomy is central to this framework. Universities cannot aspire to global excellence without the freedom to recruit talent, create academic programmes, establish partnerships, allocate resources and pursue long term strategic goals. Excessive government control inevitably encourages caution and short term thinking. Autonomy, when combined with accountability, creates the conditions necessary for ambition and innovation. The universities that consistently perform well globally are almost always institutions that enjoy substantial academic, administrative and financial autonomy.
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Equally important is investment in faculty. One reason the global higher education hierarchy changes so slowly is that great universities invest relentlessly in academic talent. Faculty quality remains the single most important determinant of long term institutional excellence. In India, while substantial investments have been made in infrastructure, investment in attracting and retaining the very best faculty remains uneven. There are perhaps only four or five private universities in the country today that offer salaries, benefits and research support comparable to, or exceeding, what is available even in the IIT system. Without sustained investment in faculty, aspirations of global excellence will remain difficult to realize. World class universities are not built through world class buildings alone.
Strong governing boards form the third pillar of institutional success. In many of the world's leading universities, boards are not ceremonial bodies that meet occasionally to approve budgets and review reports. They function as custodians of institutional purpose. They think in terms of decades rather than annual cycles and ensure that major strategic priorities survive individual leadership tenures. They provide stability without becoming obstacles to change and preserve institutional memory while allowing institutions to evolve.
As India seeks to build universities capable of competing with the very best in the world, the conversation must therefore move beyond rankings themselves. It’s time we devise mechanisms to allow our institutions to focus on autonomy, outstanding faculty, strong leadership and governance continuity. Rankings may measure the outcome, but they cannot substitute for the long and often difficult process of institution building. The real lesson from this year's rankings is therefore not about where India stands today. It is about what will determine where India stands twenty years from now.
(This article is written by Prof. Ramgopal Rao is Vice Chancellor for BITS Pilani group of institutions and former director of IIT Delhi. Views expressed are personal.)