Five Years of India Rankings NIRF and its Impact on Performance Parameters of Engineering Institutions in India Pt 2 Research and Professional Practices

This article analyses data on five years of India Rankings to assess its impact on performance parameters of institutions of higher education in terms of publications, citations, patents, highly-cited publications and research funding under broad category of parameter named “Research and Professional Practices”. The analysis of data on five years of India Rankings, i.e. 2016 to 2020 on various performance parameters of HEIs provides an interesting insight and reveals that participating institutions are making strenuous effort to improve their performance on various parameters or sub-parameters identified by the NIRF for ranking of HEIs. It is note that the number of publications, citations, and highly-cited publications (HCP) by eligible applicant institutions have increased exponentially over a period of five years from 2016 to 2020. It is interesting to note that per cent of publications, citations, and HCP by the 100 top-ranked institutions has decreased with corresponding increase of publications, citations, and HCP of the remaining institutions. This trend indicates that a good number of remaining institutions have not only intensified their research and publications activities but are also attracting their share of citations. It is also observed that a significant number of NIRF eligible applicants did not have any publication, however, per cent of institutions having “0” publications have decreasing gradually every year from 2017 to 2020. Noticeable and consistent increase in total publications of India, NIRF Eligible Applicants, 100 top-ranked institutions and remaining institutions in Overall category was noticed during past four years, i.e. 2017 to 2020. However, per cent increase in publications of the 100 top-ranked institutions was the highest in overall category.