(16 March 2026) University rankings have become a key measure of success for India, even at the highest political levels. Yet, as in other countries ranking regimes have created distortions in research practices. Exploring the data behind India’s “ranking mania” Muthu Madhan argues rankings have failed to deliver on their promises.
“When metrics are treated as gospel, especially when they are abused, they cease to be a map and become a mirage.
Indian private universities have shown that publication volumes can be scaled without research ecosystems or sustained funding. Overwhelmed by this proliferation, journals have succumbed to indiscriminate publishing.
This radical growth has inevitably triggered investigations into corrupt practices linking Indian universities to paper mills and citation cartels. By penalising retractions, the government’s NIRF effectively concedes that malpractice is widespread. This trend subverts the very intent of introducing academic rankings, and fundamentally misleads stakeholders.
Rankings are notorious for producing distortions, a fact now widely acknowledged in India after more than a decade of the ranking regime. Yet, trapped Indian institutions chase them for symbolic gains. Paradoxically, enthusiasts expect ranking agencies to fix the very absurdities they have themselves created. It is a classic vicious cycle. As Gioia and Corley observed, “In some significant sense all the things wrong with the rankings matter considerably less than the plain fact that the rankings matter.” Ignoring serious distortions to promote rankings as objective indicators will undermine the credibility of Indian universities.”
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