For some years Indian institutions have not performed well in the global rankings. This is especially true of the Times Higher Education (THE) world and regional rankings. In the most recent THE World University Rankings no Indian university reached the top 300 and only three were in the top 400. One of those in the top 350 was, surprisingly, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Ropar, which is only a dozen years old and is not highly regarded.
Seven of the leading (IITs), Bombay, Delhi, Guwahati, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Madras and Roorkee, have declared that they will not take part in the THE rankings this year, citing its lack of transparency among other concerns. They said they would reconsider participation if THE made changes to its methodology.
THE, which claims to be the gold standard of global university rankings, has said that Indian higher education has great potential but that the country has failed to provide sufficient funding for research or to recruit talented international scientists.
According to a recent statement, THE believes that the boycott would be detrimental to the IITs and to India as whole.
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