While China has made major strides in higher education during the past five years, Asia’s other developing economic superpower has struggled to put its ambitious plans for universities into practice. India’s plans to develop world-class universities and triple its participation rate in the coming years are well publicized, yet its sluggish progress towards these goals has been the source of keen debate.
In this year’s QS University Rankings: Asia, the five leading Indian institutions all rank lower than last year, and there has been a general lack of progress since the rankings began in 2009 – surprising, since for much of that period the Indian economy was expanding at a rate of up to 9% per year.
The issues affecting India’s rankings performance are clear. The highly selective intake of the IITs is reflected in an excellent reputation among employers, but in many other areas they lag behind their regional peers. Student/faculty ratios are often very high, and though their research productivity and impact has shown some signs of improvement, it still lags considerably behind the leading universities in the region.
Yet it is in the international measures that one of the major issues preventing the development of India’s universities into international centers of excellence is on display. Whereas Singapore has based its remarkable success on recruiting international talent and fostering collaboration with the West, India remains insular. No Indian university makes the top 100 for either the proportion of international students and international faculty.
There are numerous reasons why this is the case, and it could well be argued that India has other more immediate priorities, such as improving access and infrastructure. Yet until it is able to effectively embrace the global nature of international higher education it is likely that its universities will struggle to break into the regional elite, despite the vast potential of the Indian economy.