West Bengal shortlists 100 colleges for NIRF ranking focus, 46 HEIs to get ‘first-priority’: Report

The West Bengal government has shortlisted 100 colleges to compete in the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) rankings. The government will prepare and help the institutions in improving their academic, institutional standards, and participate at the national level to secure a place among the top 100 higher education institutions in the country, The Telegraph reported.

Among the 100 institutions, the government has prioritised 46 colleges, including four from north Bengal as “first-priority,” while 44 more colleges have been chosen as the “second-priority” for the NIRF rankings, as per the report.

ABN Seal College in Cooch Behar, the Darjeeling Government College, the Southfield College in Darjeeling and the Gour Mahavidyalaya in Malda are the four colleges among the 46 first-priority list, the report read.

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'Higher the NIRF grade, the larger the funding'

Dhritiman Chakraborty, an English teacher and NIRF coordinator at Gour Mahavidyalay, said in the report: “The better the NIRF ranking, the greater is the possibility of receiving support and financial assistance from different authorities of higher education. The higher the grade, the larger the funding.”

As part of the preparation for the NIRF rankings, several teams from the state higher education department will visit the institutions to assess their infrastructure and academic facilities, it added.

The teams will also guide the institutions on areas requiring improvement to meet the NIRF qualifying parameters, it said.

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West Bengal govt's NIRF Mission Mode Initiative

“Bengal has 434 colleges, among which more than 380 have obtained accreditation from the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC). A college needs to have a valid NAAC certificate to be considered for the NIRF selection. For selecting the 100 colleges under the two categories, the NAAC grade and the tenure for the validity of the accreditation, which is five years, were taken into consideration,” a senior academic associated with the Gour Banga University said in the report.

A two-member team from the higher education department will visit Gour Mahavidyalaya and inspect the infrastructure, digitisation, number of classrooms and labs, lab equipment, academic results, teacher-student ratio and vocational courses, it added.

Once the teams submit their assessment reports, the higher education department will launch its “NIRF Mission Mode Initiative,” it said.

The government, through the initiative, will guide the selected higher education to improve their performance and compete with other top institutions across the country, the report read.