New Delhi: The QS World University Rankings-Asia for 2024 has been released, and India has achieved a remarkable feat by overtaking China in the number of universities ranked in the list. Out of the 856 universities ranked in Asia, 148 are from India, which is 37 more than last year. China follows with 133 universities, and Japan with 96 universities.
The rankings also include three new countries: Myanmar, Cambodia, and Nepal, which have entered the list for the first time. The rankings are based on 11 indicators, such as academic reputation, employer reputation, faculty-student ratio, international faculty, international students, inbound exchange students, outbound exchange students, papers per faculty, citations per paper, international research network, and staff with Ph.D.
Among the Indian universities, IIT Bombay has retained its top position, ranking 37th in Asia. It is followed by IISc Bangalore (52nd), IIT Delhi (46th), IIT Madras (53rd), IIT Kharagpur (61st), and IIT Kanpur (66th), which are all in the top 100.
Ben Souter, Senior Vice President at QS, said, “The growing number of Indian universities in the QS rankings reflects the expansion of India’s higher education landscape. While the significant growth in the number of Indian institutions and their research contribution marks a major development in the academic profile of the region, it also paves the way for India to further enhance its position in the global academic community.”
However, India still lags behind the regional average in some indicators, such as academic reputation and employer reputation, which measure the perception of the quality of education and graduates among academics and employers respectively. India also has a low score in the international research network indicator, which measures the extent of international collaboration in research.
On the other hand, India has performed well in the papers per faculty indicator, which measures the research productivity of the faculty members. India has the second-best regional result in this indicator among the higher education systems with more than 10 universities. India has also achieved its best average score for staff with PhD indicator, which shows that the faculty members are highly qualified and have strong research output.
Another area where India has shown improvement is the outbound student mobility indicator, which measures the number of students who go abroad for higher education. India has surpassed China for the first time in 15 years in this indicator, with a significant increase in the number of Indian students pursuing education in the US.
“India appears to be attempting to balance two ambitious goals: catering to the large number of students in the country and increasing its appeal to international students. Achieving efficiency in both areas simultaneously is a major challenge, especially at a pace that matches global trends,” QS said in a statement.
