Government institute rankings hit by staff crunch, poor research in Odisha

BHUBANESWAR: Private universities fared better than the state-run-universities in the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) published by the Union ministry of human resource development (MHRD) on Thursday. Not a single state university from Odisha could make it to the top 100 institutions listed in NIRF's overall ranking category.
In the university category, private institutions like SOA secured a rank of 20 followed by KIIT (24). But no state university secured a place in the top-50 rank. Only Utkal University managed to settle at 96 rank in this category. For the first time, a state-run university from Odisha secured a rank in the top 100 institutions listed by NIRF.
The Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology (VSSUT), Burla and Sambalpur University found their place in the rank band of 101-150, while Berhampur University secured a place in the rank band of 151-200 in the category of university.
Other state varsities like the Fakir Mohan University, Balasore, Ravenshaw University in Cuttack and others did not find a place among the top-200 universities of the country. Experts blame teacher shortage and poor research output as the major reasons behind the poor show of the state public universities in the ranking framework.
There are five parameters in NIRF to give rating to an institution. These are teaching, learning and resources (TLR), research and professional practice (RP), graduation outcomes (GO), outreach and inclusivity (OI) and peer perception. All these parameters have 100 marks each.
Utkal University secured 42.89 out of 100 in TLR, 11.5 in RP, 77.12 in GO, 44.13 in OI and 39 in peer perception. It secured only 11.5 out of 100 in RP because of poor research output. "The university should improve the quantity and quality of publications. It should file more patents and work consistently on intellectual property rights," said a senior professor. "It is important to get more research funding and earn consultancy amount from different government and non-government organisations or companies for research works. Usually, major institutions get many offers from different companies and government organisations to conduct certain studies and research works. In this way, the institutions earn good money. Our universities should also keep this in mind," said the professor, who has helped the universities in documentation work before taking part in the ranking process.
Another important criteria is the teacher-student ratio. "Most of the state universities in Odisha are facing a shortage of teachers. Some universities have completed recruitment and others are yet to complete it. We should try to keep the ratio below 1:9 (one teacher for nine students). But some of the universities have to manage with 1:20 ratio. It will obviously decrease the marks in the TLR section," said a senior professor of a university.
The state universities receive few students from outside the state and country. Under the outreach and inclusivity category, these universities should think out-of-the-box to attract students from outside. For inclusivity, the universities should deploy around 20% women faculty and admit 50% women students. Besides, it should provide facilities to physically challenged along with socially and economically-deprived students.
Govind J Chakrapani, the vice-chancellor of Berhampur University, said, "We could not complete the faculty recruitment process owing to the pandemic. But we will complete this process and appoint teachers after the situation gets better. Next time we can do well in the teacher-student ratio. We are also trying to improve other parameters to secure a good rank."
Asoka Kumar Das, vice chairman of the Odisha State Higher Education Council, said it is just the beginning. "One of our universities secured a place in the top 100 universities of the country. The other two universities also secured a place in the top 200. We will work on all the five parameters and improve our ranks," he added.