QS Asia Rankings 2022: No Indian University Makes It To Top 10; Brings Back The Debate Of Quality Vs. Quantity

With the declaration of Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) Asia ranking on 02nd November 2022, 687 top Asian Universities were featured with 118 Indian universities making it on the chart. Five Indian institutes along with IISC and Delhi University have secured a place in the Top 100. Despite so many Indian Institutes making it to the list of top-Asian Universities, Indian institutes are still behind their neighboring countries such as China and Singapore. 

In the Top-10 spot, five universities are from China, while none belong to India. Let us understand more about the QS ranking system and the University Rankings. 

TOP-10 Indian Institutes in QS Rankings

Among the 118 Indian Institutes, IIT Bombay has secured the first rank of 47 (QS Asia Rank) with an overall score of 71(out of 100). IIT Bombay is followed by IIT Delhi and five others making it to Top-100. 

Following are the some of the significant Indian Institutes which made it into the list:

As it can be observed, only 7 Indian Universities made it into the Top-100, out of which five are Indian institutes. The other two are IISC (Indian Institute of Science) and the University of Delhi. Thus, only 5.93% of the 118 Indian Universities secured a place in Top-100.

QS Ranking Methodology 

QS ranking has received recognition from the International Ranking Expert Group (IREG). It is regarded as one of the top 3 most influential rankings in the world. The Academic Ranking of World Universities and Times Higher Education World University Rankings are the other two. 

“QS Asia University Rankings highlight the top universities in Asia each year. The methodology used to create the QS Asia ranking is similar to that used for the QS World University Rankings but with additional benchmarks and adapted considerations.”

The criteria & their corresponding weightage used to rank universities are explained as follows: 

• Academic Reputation (30%)
• Employer Reputation (20%)
• Faculty/student ratio (10%)
• International research network (10%)
• Citations per research paper (10%) and papers per faculty (5%)
• Staff with a PhD (5%)

Quantity OR Quality? Indian Universities are stuck in this debate

Similar to previous year’s ranking, Mainland China boasts the most universities – 126 (out of 687 featured) with India & Japan in second and third place respectively. However, the list has been topped by the National University of Singapore (NUS) securing an overall score of 100/100. 

The top-10 university are as follows: 

As we can observe, out of the 118 Indian Universities, which is the second-highest, not a single University made it in the Top-10. The reason is the Indian research quality, not keeping up with the global standards. The teaching capacity and employability scores of Indian universities are not appealing either. Thus, contributing to overall lower rankings. 

On the contrary, out of the 126 Chinese Universities, 12.6% of the Universities secured their spot in the Top-10. That’s more than twice that of India. 

Although India has performed well in research productivity, the QS ranking of Indian Universities suggests that there is a lot of scope for improvement. With the Universities going farther down the list, efforts should be put to revive the rankings in the following years.

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