© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
Tags:
Journalism of Courage
QS Asia Rankings 2026: With the country’s top IITs seeing a drop in their positions in the QS Asia Rankings 2026, IIT Kharagpur Director Suman Chakraborty said that faculty members at IITs are engaged in activities that create transformative impact, but don’t immediately reflect in citation metrics.
Seven IITs, which feature in the top 10 among Indian institutions in the QS Asia Rankings 2026, have seen a significant fall in their ranks this year compared to last year. Five of them – IITs Delhi, Bombay, Madras, Kanpur, and Kharagpur – have recorded their lowest rank since at least 2021.
The ranking of Asian universities, released on Tuesday, reflects an eastward concentration of top performance, QS said. Indian institutions retain strong reputations but face stiff competition from those in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Malaysia, which are outperforming them on metrics like ‘citations per paper’, which is a measure of the impact of research, faculty-student ratio, and international student ratio.
Reacting to the rankings, Prof Chakraborty said: “The QS rankings are one of several reference points in a very broad and complex global higher education ecosystem. A movement in ranking, up or down, should ideally be read in context rather than in isolation. IIT Kharagpur has always believed in driving its own metrics of global relevance, those rooted in national priorities and social impact, rather than being limited by conventional yardsticks alone.”
IIT Kharagpur, sixth among Indian institutions, saw its rank drop from 60 in 2025 to 77 in 2026. This year’s rank is also a steep fall from the institute’s rank of 58 recorded in 2021.
“We do recognise that some parameters like faculty-student ratio, international faculty and student diversity, and citation counts per faculty are areas where all IITs, including IIT Kharagpur, can certainly strengthen themselves. However, the challenge is not simply about numbers, it’s about alignment with our distinctive national mission,” Prof Chakraborty said.
He added: “For example, many of our faculty are deeply engaged in translational research, rural innovation, entrepreneurship incubation, and public healthcare technologies — activities that create transformative impact but don’t immediately reflect in citation metrics. Similarly, our student body is predominantly domestic by design, because we are deeply committed to empowering Indian youth across social and geographic spectra.”
Pointing out that “our vision is to move from being a ‘ranked institution’ to being a benchmark institution” that shapes the metrics of tomorrow, he added: “Nonetheless, we are working consciously to internationalize our collaborations, attract globally diverse postdoctoral scholars, and enhance faculty mobility, not just to improve rankings, but to create a more porous, globally networked academic culture.”
Compared to last year’s rankings, IIT Bombay saw the steepest fall of 23 ranks, followed by IIT Kharagpur which fell 17 ranks, and IIT Delhi which dropped 15 ranks.
