Top Universities in India 2019

Higher education in India is witnessing a rapid expansion. A few years ago, students were limited to mostly government-run or government-funded colleges, but today, several high-quality private universities are making their presence felt in the coveted list of Top Universities in India.

There is an increasing demand for quality education and training in not just traditional but also emerging fields and disciplines, liberal arts and dual degree programmes are emerging as popular course options for students in recent times. Private universities offer dual advantage of world class educational infrastructure along with industry exposure through partnerships that only a few cash rich government colleges are able to match.

Having said that, top government universities in India that have maintained their rank order such as Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Benaras Hindu University (BHU), Jadavpur University, among many more, have continued to maintain their league owing to their focus on research, teaching experience and their public perception. These are parameters that have contributed heavily to their overall National Institute Ranking Framework or NIRF Ranking.

Top movers in 2019

Some clear winners and losers have emerged in the latest NIRF rankings released for the year 2019-20. Top universities that have gained or lost massively in their rank status this year are given below:

• Delhi Technological University gained 23 positions and moved up from Rank 70 to 47 this year
• North Eastern Hill University and Periyar University gained 22 positions each
• Anand Agricultural University and International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIITH)  both gained 16 ranks each
• Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology and Pondicherry University  both gained 11 ranks each
• Calcutta University and Homi Bhabha University  gained 9 ranks each

Some other universities that gained ranks are Kerala University (8), Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University (8), Bharathidasan University (7), NITTE University, Mangalore (7), The University of Burdwan (7), Andhra University (6), Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology (6), Dr DY Patil Vidyapeeth Pune (6) and Koneru Lakshmaiah Education Foundation University (6).

Nine universities also made an entry in the Top 100 Universities list. Noteworthy among these are Sri Ramachandra Institute of Higher Education and Research that has made a straight entry at 33^rd position.

Placements and career prospects provided by top universities in India

Graduation Outcome is one of the most important parameters that has been used to define top universities in India. This is further broken down into placements or entrepreneurship opportunities, median salary, number of PhD students and number of students admitted to top universities.

IISc alumni command a salary ranging from INR 4.2 LPA to INR 23.9 LPA according to the data exclusively available on Shiksha from its parent concern, Naukri.com. For both JNU and BHU, median to max salary ranges from INR 3.25 LPA to INR 10 LPA. Whereas for Jadavpur University, this figure ranges from INR 5 LPA to INR 14 LPA. More details on university, alumni, placements and salaries can be seen by clicking on the placement link given below of each university.

Average median salaries of an IIT graduate ranges from INR 8 LPA to INR 14.50 LPA depending on whether this is a new IIT or an old IIT. As opposed to this, average median salaries of students completing engineering from other universities would range from INR 5 LPA to INR 7 LPA indicating that recruitments are still more favourable at the grand old bastion of engineering in India.

Another interesting trend in placements is a visible improvement in the average median salary of a student who has graduated from a five-year programme as opposed to that of a four-year programme. According to NIRF data released for engineering colleges, the average median salary of a student graduating from a four-year programme increased by 7.72 per cent  between 2017-18 and 2018-19 as opposed to that of a student graduating from a five-year integrated programme, where the average median salary increased by 20.34 per cent over the same reference period. This implies a better return on investment for an additional year of study since the percentage increase is enough to offset the additional tuition cost the student would have to incur for another year.

Given below is the latest rank order of universities by NIRF along with their admission details, courses, fees and placements. Click on each of these links to get more details on that respective university.