Maharashtra plans to improve NIRF rankings for public universities; targets global partnerships, NRI intake

Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis asked public universities in the state to make special efforts and a time-bound plan to improve their national and international rankings and academic quality, and said that a dedicated digital dashboard will be set up to monitor each university.

Speaking at the review meeting on the implementation of the National Education Policy (NEP) and Vision Maharashtra 2047, Fadnavis said that universities should assess their current academic quality, research, infrastructure, and rankings in higher education to develop a time-bound plan. In line with this, the state government will help create an online dashboard to speed up monitoring, he said.

Maharashtra universities should aim to strengthen quality education and skill-based programmes by scaling up industry partnerships, internships, and apprenticeships to improve employability, the CM said.

With private universities advancing rapidly, the chief minister said public universities should pay more attention to improving quality.

A roadmap for public universities up to 2047 to improve their National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) rankings, published by the ministry of education, was also presented by the additional chief secretary of the department B Venugopal Reddy.

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Maharashtra's roadmap to improve NIRF rankings

The meeting discussed several strategies to improve the performance of public universities in NIRF rankings .

To make Maharashtra a global education destination, officials discussed steps to prevent students from leaving the state and to attract NRI and foreign students.

The plan included generating high-TRL (technology readiness level) research, and commercially valuable patents. To improve the standard of education in colleges and prepare students for global employment, the state government suggested aligning the curricula with future skill demands and using university resources for collaboration with foreign universities.