Parliament Question: NIRF India Rankings 2025

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OF HIGHER EDUCATION LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 1257 ANSWERED ON 08.12.2025 NIRF India Rankings 2025 1257. Shri Khalilur Rahaman: Will the Minister of Education be please to state: (a) the details of the list of Engineering Institutes across the country as per the National Institution Ranking Framework (NIRF) India Ranking 2025, State/UT-wise; (b) whether the Government has assessed the implementation of research programmes and adequate infrastructure facilities and if so, the details thereof; (c) the initiatives taken by the Government to ensure that institutes meet the NIRF parameters of teaching, learning and resources, research and professional practice as well as graduation outcome; and (d) if so, the details thereof? ANSWER MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION (DR. SUKANTA MAJUMDAR) (a) to (d): To promote healthy competition among Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) was launched in 2015 by the Government of India for the annual ranking (called India Rankings) of these HEIs. The methodology of India Rankings is based on five broad parameters, i.e. “Teaching, Learning and Resources,” “Research and Professional Practices,” “Graduation Outcomes,” “Outreach and Inclusivity,” and “Peer Perception”. The list of ranked institutions in the Engineering category is available on the NIRF website at the link: https://www.nirfindia.org/Rankings/2025/EngineeringRanking.html The Government of India has been making concerted efforts for institutional development, capacity building, democratization of research and promotion of innovation to enhance the quality of education across the country. Following are some of the initiatives: In addition to budgetary support to Centrally Funded Higher Education Institutions, Government of India also provides financial support to State Governments under Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA)/ Pradhan Mantri Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (PM-USHA) scheme under three components namely, “Enhancing Quality and Excellence in select State Universities”, “Infrastructure Grants to Universities” and “Multi-Disciplinary Education and Research Universities (MERU)” for improvement in Higher Education.Further, with an objective of Research & Development driven integration of academic, industry and enterprise creation, Research Parks have been set up in premier HEIs to establish research ecosystem around these institutions. These research parks facilitate funded research from Industry, promoting Industry-Academia collaborations. Since 2014, Government has established 6 new Research Parks, one each at IIT Delhi, IIT Kanpur, IIT Guwahati, IIT Hyderabad and IISc Bangalore and IIT Gandhinagar. With an aim to attract the best minds to pursue high - quality research in India's premier academic institutions, the Government launched Prime Minister’s Research Fellows (PMRF) Scheme in 2018-19 with total financial outlay of Rs. 1650 Crores. Also, to promote research activities in HEIs, more than 6000 HEIs have set up Research and Development Cells. In alignment with the principles of NEP 2020, Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF), has been established as an apex body to provide high-level strategic direction for research, innovation and entrepreneurship in the fields of natural sciences including mathematical sciences, engineering and technology, environmental and earth sciences, health and agriculture. Government has approved ONOS scheme to expand access to scholarly journals to a vast diaspora of students, faculty, researchers and scientists of all disciplines, of all Higher Educational Institutions under the management of the Central or State Government and Research & Development Institutions of the Central Government, through a national subscription coordinated by a central agency. More than 6300 such institutions are covered under this scheme. A total of about Rs.6,000 crore has been allocated for the scheme for 3 calendar years, 2025, 2026 and 2027. Ministry of Education launched the World Class Institutions scheme to grant the status of Institution of Eminence (IoE) to 10 higher educational institutions each from the public and private category and enable them to emerge as world class teaching and research institutions. Twelve institutions have been notified as IoE so far. These include 08 public category institutions, and 04 private category institutions. Only public institutions are provided funds under the scheme. An amount of Rs 6198.99 Crore (approximately) has been sanctioned for the 08 public institutions since the inception of the scheme. Furthermore, in order to conduct interdisciplinary research, develop cutting-edge applications, and create scalable solutions in three areas of health, sustainable cities and Agriculture, Government has approved establishment of three Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Artificial intelligence (Al), one each in the areas of health, sustainable cities and agriculture with a total financial outlay of Rs. 990.00 Cr over the period of FY 2023-24 to FY 2027-28. An AI CoE in field of Education with an outlay of Rs. 500 crores has been sanctioned in IIT Madras. The ‘Multidisciplinary Education and Research Improvement in Technical Education’ Scheme has been approved for implementation in 275 technical institutions comprising 175 engineering institutions and 100 polytechnics. The objective of the scheme is to improve the quality, equity and governance in technical education covering all States/UTs by implementing interventions aligned with the National Educational Policy-2020 (NEP-2020). It is a ‘Central Sector Scheme’ with total financial implication of Rs.4200 crore for a period from 2025-26 to 2029-30. An outcome – based monitoring of various schemes under Output-Outcome Monitoring Framework (OOMF) is carried out as part of assessment of various schemes. *****