Recurring Patterns and Unresolved Questions: Rethinking National Ranking of Architecture and Planning Institutions

The recently announced National Ranking of Architecture and Planning Institutions for 2025 has not thrown up any surprises. The top 10 colleges remained unchanged, with a minor swapping of places within. Three institutions improved their rankings marginally. The National Institute of Technology Calicut (NIT-K) moved one rank from third to second, while the other two institutions moved two places: Jamia Milia Islamia (JMI) from seventh to fifth, and the National Institute of Technology – Rourkela (NIT-R) from ninth to seventh. Among those who slipped, the School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi (SPA-D) moved a few ranks down from fifth to eighth, while the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT-K) moved from second to third, and the National Institute of Technology – Tiruchirappalli (NIT-T) moved from eighth to ninth rank. (Figure 1).   

Importantly, the overall scores of institutions are converging, and the variance between them is coming down. To gloss over this as a recurring pattern and treat it merely as a stabilisation of the ranking process would be a mistake, for it raises issues that undermine the credibility of the ranking exercise, the notion of excellence the process is meant to promote and the fairness of it all. 

This paper takes a closer look and highlights the persisting opacity in the ranking method. It argues that, as differences between institutions are narrowing to two decimal points, which upsets rankings, the lack of transparency has become a serious issue. The perception parameter, in particular, needs to be closely scrutinised.   

Second, the paper cautions that the continued dominance of large and well-funded government institutions in rankings will soon leave private institutions wondering whether they will ever have a fair chance of entering the top 15 ranks. What should the way forward be: create a separate category for private institutions or improve the ranking methodology to correct biases and barriers?  

Third, the paper highlights the larger conundrum that still prevails in evaluating professional education. What is a good measure to assess the excellence in professional education? Is it the publications of peer-reviewed research papers or the ability to impact and contribute to practices? 

Overview 

Since the Architecture domain was included in the ranking in 2018, and Planning was combined with it in 2023, the number of institutions participating in NIRF has increased. Last year, 115 Institutions participated, and this year, the number has increased to 131. Of the 131 institutions, 96 were located in the southern and western regions, and the remaining 35 were situated in the northern and eastern regions. The institutions were evaluated using 19 parameters spread over five categories and ranked based on their overall scores. The categories are Teaching, Learning, and Resources (TLR), Research and Professional Practice (RP), Graduate Outcomes (GO), Outreach and Inclusivity (OI), and Perception (PR) (Table 1).  

Table 1: NIRF Rankings 2025 – Parameter Scores. Source: NIRF India

The institution self-reports most of the data, while a few, such as the publication list and citation index, are derived from external sources, including Scopus and the Web of Science. Patent data are obtained from Derwent Innovation.  

Convergence and Categories 

Over the past two years, the top ten institutions have remained unchanged. The overall scores have reduced this year, and there is a greater degree of convergence. However, there is a clear clustering of institutions within the first fifteen (Figure 2), and the differences between them, in many instances, are narrow.

The first set of institutional clusters consists of IIT-K, IIT-R, and NIT-K, with scores above 75 on a scale of 100. The next six institutions have scored between 72 and 64. From rank 10^th to 15^th, the third cluster consists of six institutions with narrow differences. In the first cluster, only IIT-R has established a clear position, leading with 83.95; however, the difference between the next two institutions is only 0.51.

In the second set of institutions, the difference between rank six and rank seven is 0.01, the difference between ranks seven and eight is 0.61, and the difference between ranks eight and nine is 0.81. The score differences get narrower in the third set of institutions. The 11^th to 15^th rank scores are 60.69, 60.48, 60.16, 59.7, and 59.63, respectively. Changes, as narrow as 0.2, can make a big difference in ranking. For instance, NIT Rourkela, by improving its score by 0.02, would move from rank 7 to rank 6. Similarly, if SPA Bhopal’s scores had changed by 0.53, it would have entered the prestigious top 10 ranks, pushing VNIT-Bhopal to 11th place. 

One cannot attribute the narrow margins solely to high competitiveness. A better understanding emerges when we analyse the contribution of different parameters in the variability of scores (Figure 3). The Perception score is the largest source of variability in scores, contributing 53% of the variation, followed by the Research and Professional Practices (RPC) score, which accounts for 30% of the variation. Unfortunately, the evaluation of these two parameters has not improved.  

Perception Puzzle 

The 2024 ranking report explained that peer perception is measured by surveying employers, professionals, and academics to ascertain their preferences for graduates from different institutions. In 2025, too, the method remained unchanged, and an online platform was created to ‘capture perception inputs’ in a ‘prescribed format.’ Barring a broad overview in terms of vote share for each domain, neither the details of the respondents nor the analysis were provided this year. It was the same last year as well. The summary of responses is also absent, making it difficult to understand and analyse. 

Our analysis of the reported individual institution scores reveals that the Perception score is not highly correlated with any of the parameters, raising further questions about the methods used to calculate it and underscoring the need for transparency. For instance, SPA-D, with a perfect 100 perception score, has dropped in ranking, from 5th to 8th position, with a significant decline in Teaching and Learning (TLR) and Outreach and Inclusivity (OI) scores. Five of the top 10 institutions have perception scores less than 55. Another instructive example is that the perception score of the 12th-ranked SPA Bhopal is higher than that of the 5th-ranked Jamia Millia Islamia. Chandigarh University is another example. It has scored only 15.06 in terms of perception, yet, due to better performances in other parameters, it is ranked 13. If Chandigarh University, with a total score of 59.7, had gained 1.5 points more in perception, it would have ranked among the top 10. Any university wishing to review the feedback and find ways to improve would find it impossible, since the data and analysis are unavailable. 

If we examine the improvement in NIT Patna’s ranking (from 27 to 13), the jump in position was made possible by an improvement in the TLR score, achieved by raising the faculty-to-student ratio and having a higher share of faculty with PhD and experience. However, the perception score for NIT Patna has declined. What raises further doubts is that, across the ranks, scores on graduate outcomes (GO), which are expected to influence perceptions among parents and students, are the most negatively correlated with the perception score.  

The limited data published regarding the voting share of peers and employers in the perception parameter suggests a disproportionate influence of this score, further questioning the relevance of this parameter in its current form. 

The 2025 report does not define ‘vote share,’ but we can infer that it refers to the percentage of people who participated in the survey and provided feedback on institutions. The Architecture and Planning category is among the lowest scoring. It has drawn only 1.51% of the total academic respondents and 0.87% of the total employers who participated in the perception survey (the total number of respondents is not given). Engineering institutions, in comparison, have attracted 16.35% and 18.49% participation, respectively. The report downplays the low scores in architecture and planning, suggesting that they indicate a lesser emphasis by peers compared to other disciplines.¹  

Scores computed from such low participation cannot be taken as a reliable indicator. If participation does not meet a reliability threshold, the parameter must be removed to ensure that institutions receive a fair evaluation and are not affected by bias or skewed representation.

Public and Private Institutions 

Public institutions have dominated the top fifteen positions in the architecture and planning domains over the last two years, except for CEPT University. CEPT is the only privately funded organisation that has consistently made a place in the top ten. The only other private institution to make it into the top fifteen is Chandigarh University.

Chandigarh University has performed well compared to other publicly funded institutions in terms of Financial Resources and their Utilisation (FRU) (Figure 4). It lags behind institutions ranked above, such as NIT Patna and MNIT Jaipur, in the research-related scores and the perception score.  

FRU is highly correlated with the overall ranks, with a correlation value of 0.89 (Figure 5). This finding is particularly significant for private and smaller institutions, which often have limited resources and heavy reliance on fees. Unlike their publicly funded counterparts, private institutions have severely limited or no access to government grants, and in several states, they are subject to strict fee regulations that do not provide them with the financial flexibility required to compete. Large private institutions with high student enrollment may have sufficient resources to approach those of publicly funded IITs and NITs (Figure 6), but they seem to have lower per-student expenditure numbers, indicating a limited capacity to foster a well-resourced academic ecosystem.  

Per student expenditure numbers further reveal this dichotomy. Publicly funded institutions, with small student bases, can spend a significantly higher amount per student to provide for a richer academic experience (Figure 7). The top three ranked public institutions are able to spend more than ₹ 10 lakh per student, compared to the average of ₹ 3.9 lakh spent by others in the top 15.² All other performance parameters, such as publications, teaching, and learning, are outcomes closely tied to expenditure, and the difference in spending is reflected in the scores. This could also have an impact on perception. It is no surprise that private institutions feel unfairly compared to well-funded government institutions.   

Publications and professional colleges 

The Research and Professional Practices (RPC) is a critical score and accounts for 30% of the variation in ranks in architecture and planning. The NIRF 2025 has considered publications and citations for the three years between 2021 and 2023. Of the 123  architecture and planning colleges considered for this score, 100 had zero publications. Only one institution, with 14 publications, was considered the most productive and three institutions, with a total of 15 publications, were considered medium productive. In comparison, 1,439 engineering colleges have produced 2,75,820 papers.³ It appears that, due to the low volume or low level of research activities, architecture planning institutions were not featured in any subsequent analysis of research and consultancy outputs in the report. 

Among the generally low levels of publishing in architecture and planning institutions, it is not difficult to guess which institutions would have performed better (there is no college-wise breakdown in the reports). An analysis of publication levels in the overall institutional category offers a clue. Government-funded institutions contribute approximately 65% to 70% of the papers published and have a similar share in citations. We can infer that IITs and NIITs excel in research outputs, which is further confirmed by their individual research scores. This will also be the case in architecture and planning, too. The research output is also positively correlated with the financial resources and the number of faculty members with higher qualifications and experience. IITs and NITs have the resources and environment to encourage publication. The same cannot be said for other institutions. This point is further reinforced by the fact that mere scale, that is, student numbers, does not guarantee more or better publications. The analysis shows that enrolment has a strong negative correlation, i.e., larger institutions, in terms of student strength, have not necessarily done well in research. 

An equally important question is whether peer publications are an effective indicator of excellence, industry relevance, and meaningful knowledge production in professional institutions such as architecture and planning. Currently, the framework assesses research and professional practice scores, with a focus on bibliometrics, specifically publication numbers and citations. However, architectural and planning academia worldwide has been complaining that their disciplines are not `scholastic pursuits’ as they are in other `hard sciences’. It is a problem-solving, practice-oriented, and intensely skill-based one. Architecture and planning disciplines involve research and clear outcomes, but they are not aligned with protocols set by other disciplines.⁴ 

Architecture and planning institutions, when brought under common evaluative frameworks such as NIRF, doubt whether the frameworks adequately and accurately recognise their discipline-specific aspects of knowledge production. They are concerned that the new `scholarly regimentation’ and `audit-oriented criteria are negatively affecting their knowledge production, standing and access to funds, and their work is (still) far from being considered mainstream research.’⁵ 

Equally valid are facts that current evaluations overlook the specifics of their domains and alternative forms of research and knowledge production.  

The NIRF perception survey is intended to address this partly by factoring in peer views. However, unfortunately, it is opaque, and the minuscule participation by peers and employers does not make it meaningful. In this context, as we have discussed elsewhere,⁷ NIRF must consider professional institutions’ focus on applied research and manuals that directly support practice as important and valid outcomes as paper publications.

Going forward 

The Berlin Principles on Ranking of Higher Education Institutions, a global framework that institutions use to review the ranking process, unambiguously emphasise transparency, reliability, verifiability, auditing, and quality assurance of data and analysis.⁸ On these counts, NIRF, particularly in the domains of architecture and planning, needs to improve. 

As we advance, for NIRF to remain relevant and meaningful, the ranking process must be transparent. It also needs to serve as useful feedback. For this to happen, institutions should have access to data and interpretation processes to identify their strengths and weaknesses.  

Second, it’s worth exploring whether NIRF should be carried out annually or whether it would be more effective if conducted once every two years. It is unreasonable to expect significant changes in outcomes within an annual ranking system.

Furthermore, annual rankings have the danger of pushing institutions towards low-hanging fruit, such as outreach activities, rather than addressing long-term quality issues, like improving teaching outcomes and creating support systems for research. Pressure to appear in top-ranking lists is growing, and college boards are asking their institutions what holds them back from securing a place within the top 15. They want results.  

It is easily possible, due to these pressures, for one to miss out on a balanced review. For instance, let us take the case of IIT-R. It has increased its research score (RPC score: 95.6 compared to 93.2 last year), indicating, among other things, that it has allocated more funds for research. However, their score has decreased in the quality of research parameter (Quality of publication score dropped from 16.65 last year to 15.8 this year). Balancing short-term indicators with long-term strategies poses a challenge to institutions. Institutions need more time to consider how to make NIRF meaningful for them. 

Soon, private institutions and colleges are likely to demand that they not be treated on par with the IIITs and NIITs. They are beginning to see that NIRF is more favourable to IIT-like institutions that receive enviable government funding and support, while they struggle with various constraints, including fee regulation. Private institutions, therefore, would understandably prefer not to be compared with state-supported institutions and seek a separate ranking category. Given the small number of architecture and planning institutions, it is doubtful whether further fragmentation would be beneficial.

NOTES 

1. National Ranking Report 2025, pages 26-27 ↩︎
2. Per student expenditure numbers are estimated based on the reported annual capital and operating expenditure for the year 2023-24 by respective institutions and the reported total actual strength in their Undergraduate (U.G.) and Postgraduate (P.G.) programs. ↩︎
3. Ibid, 12 and 13 ↩︎
4. Many studies have captured this conflict. For a useful summary, refer to Silberberger, Jan. “Architecture Schools and Their Relationship with Research: It’s Complicated” Dimensions. Journal of Architectural Knowledge, vol. 1, no. 1, 2021, pp. 77-84.
   Kurath, Monika Maria. “Architecture as a science: Boundary work and the demarcation of design knowledge from research.” Science and Technology Studies (2015): 81-100. ↩︎
5. Silberberger, Jan. “Architecture Schools and Their Relationship with Research” ↩︎
6. Kurath, Monika Maria. “Architecture as a science.” ↩︎
7. A. Srivathsan and Astha Agarwalla, Unpacking National Ranking: What Impacts Architecture and Planning Institutions, architecture live, October 12, 2024. ↩︎
8. The Berlin Principles were formulated in 2006 by the International Ranking Expert Group (IREG), a UNESCO European Centre for Higher Education initiative. There are 16 parameters in total, organised into four sections. These parameters are designed to enhance ranking systems and hold them accountable for the quality of their data collection, methodology, and dissemination. The IREG Ranking Audit initiative is based on the Berlin Principles and offers ‘a quality stamp.’ IREG Ranking Audit document ↩︎

Read more: