Higher learnings

Global indices suggest Indian academia is deteriorating

Two sets of global indices recently yielded uncomfortable truths about India’s premier institutes of higher learning and they come at a time when competitors in Asia — China and Singapore principally — are rising steadily up the rankings. First, in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2018, no Indian institute made it to the top 200, and several dropped out of their ranking bands of the year before. Thus, our top-ranked university, the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, dropped out of the 201-250 group and landed in the 251-300 group. Likewise, IIT Madras and IIT Delhi have dropped