NIRF revamps ranking system; to introduce negative marking for retraction of research papers: Report

In a major revamp, the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) has announced to award negative marking for the retraction of research papers by journals, as reported by Telegram India.

A formula has been developed to assign negative weightage based on either the number or percentage of retractions, the report added.

Currently, NIRF awards weightage to institutions based on several parameters under teaching-learning and resources (TLR) such as research and professional practice (RP), which includes publications, intellectual property rights, and patents; graduation outcomes (GO), including metric university examination results and PhDs awarded, among others.

In June, V Ramgopal Rao, the vice-chancellor of Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS) remarked: “The NIRF should integrate negative weightage to retracted papers and papers published in journals which get delisted from the international databases like Web of Science and Scopus.”

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Institutional reactions on NIRF’s negative marking move

“Sadly, in the last two years, the number of retractions of papers has been increasing. We have got complaints about this from various quarters. Retraction will be a factor for negative weightage in this year’s NIRF,” said Anil Sahashrabudhe, chairman of the National Board of Accreditation (NBA), the agency managing the NIRF.

Sahashrabudhe also emphasized the role of internal quality assurance cells and research deans, stating that they must remain vigilant and take disciplinary action against faculty members responsible for repeated paper retractions.

He further noted that the penalty for retractions will be more significant in the future. “This year, there is a minor penalty with negative marking,” Sahashrabudhe added.

Anindya Sen, former professor of IIM Calcutta, also shared her views, stating that applying negative weightage for retracted papers poses challenges.

“The NIRF, being an annual exercise, would see the retracted papers of the previous academic year. The papers retracted after two or three years would escape the NIRF’s assessment,” she added.