Seven Premium Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) including those at IIT Delhi, Mumbai, and Chennai Thursday announced that they are boycotting the World University Rankings by British ranking agency Times Higher Education (THE). The older IITs said they doubt the transparency of the THE rankings.
“Leading IITs i.e. IIT Bombay, IIT Delhi, IIT Guwahati, IIT Kanpur, IIT Kharagpur, IIT Madras and IIT Roorkee have decided to not participate in any of the Times Higher Education (THE) - World University Rankings this year," the IITs said in a joint statement.
These IITs said they will reconsider their decision next year “if THE is able to convince them about the parameters and transparency in their ranking process."
Interestingly, three of the seven IITs have been granted Institution of Eminence (IoE) status, and the primary goal of the IoE status is to get into the top 500 in the global rankings. In the last year’s Ranking, none of the Indian institution could figure among the top 300 globally.
while IIT Bombay had said that they were ranked despite not giving any information, IIT Delhi had said that such rankings were a black box. IIT Delhi director last year had said that “In my humble opinion, institutions become great by positively impacting the ecosystem around it by imparting the highest quality education and training to the students who go through its portals. If Delhi NCR has the highest number of tech startups/Unicorns in India, IIT Delhi has played a role in it. If 14 of the 24 Unicorns created by Indians are by the alumni of one single institution-- IIT Delhi, (then) IIT Delhi is surely doing something right.
Grey Areas in Ranking Need to be Addressed
Officially, the press release says that there are several ‘grey areas’ that needs to be addressed in terms of ranking matrix and clarity is needed on ratio and the calculation being used for the ranking. This issue was cited and discussed in detail with THE officials who couldn’t convince the institutes about their ranking parameters. As per Times Now report, a senior official has said that “the institutes will reconsider their decision next year if Times Higher Education is able to convince them about the parameters and transparency in their ranking process."
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