QS ranking: IISc, IIM-Bangalore not on the same page

BENGALURU: Two institutes of national importance based out of the city — Indian Institute of Management and Indian Institute of Science — responded quite differently to the Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University Rankings 2021, which released on Wednesday. 

With IIM Bangalore ranking first in India for its Business & Management Studies, Director Rishikesh T Krishanan said, “This is certainly a huge achievement for IIMB, and I want to extend my gratitude to everyone who made this possible. We have scored well in Academic Reputation and H-Index Citation parameters and this reflects on our efforts in ensuring academic excellence in the subject and research capabilities in the domain. I would also like to congratulate all other institutions recognised by QS Ranking.

”Meanwhile, the office of the Director, IISc in a reply to Express, said that as a matter of policy, IISc does not comment on ranking exercises by non-academic and non-governmental bodies. In this spirit, IISc has no comment on the methodology used by QS on this, or any other, metric.

“Having said that, it is worth mentioning some factors that have enabled IISc to excel, leading to such recognitions: high-quality basic and applied research conducted by our faculty members and students, generous support from the Ministry of Education under its Institute of Eminence programme, and various interdisciplinary initiatives undertaken by IISc (such as autonomous systems, artificial intelligence, and quantum technologies) in line with the New Education Policy. We are also thankful to various other government agencies, alumni, corporates and philanthropists for their continued support,” they said.

IISc ranked number one on the Citations per Faculty (CPF) indicator, which put it in the league with Princeton, Havard, and even MIT. Its overall ranking, however, had dropped by one from 185 to 186 this year.