Chennai: Disappointed with not securing a top slot in the world universities ranking, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) council on Monday decided to come up with its own ranking parameters to rank IITs and all central universities next year.
IIT-Kanpur’s chairman Prof M. Anandakrishnan said that the ranking agencies in foreign countries ranked universities across the world with parameters which don’t suit Indian universities. “We discussed this issue in the IIT council and decided to come up with an India-specific framework for ranking,” he said. MHRD secretary Ashok Thakur added that IIT-Kanpur and IIT-Madras would spearhead the ranking exercise. “IITs have been working closely with the ranking agencies and they will come up with the framework by March next year,” he said.
Pointing out that the ranking would be India-centric with parameters which suit Indian universities. Thakur said that IITs had been helping people from diverse backgrounds and economically weaker sections of society to pursue higher education, which the ranking agencies don’t take into account. “Our ranking system will first rank all Indian institutions, including IITs, central and state universities. By December we will have a raw format and after which we will have consultations with stakeholders to release the ranking,” he added.
The 48th council meet has also announced a new initiative—Global Initiative for Academic Network (GIAN) under which 1,000 top faculty and researchers from foreign universities will be invited to visit IITs and motivate young people to take up research. The directors and chairmen also discussed setting up an alumni centre at Bengaluru to facilitate industry-institute collaboration.
“Former IIT Bombay director Ashok Mishra proposed to set up an alumni centre in Bengaluru, as it is the IT capital of the world, which will enable start-ups and bring industry together with the institutes,” Thakur said.n IIT-Kanpur has expressed its interest to work on a project to link heritage cities and waterways with science & innovations.
