Page 68 - EW April 2025

Cover Story EW India Private University Rankings 2025-26

India's top-ranked private liberal

arts & humanities universities

Following liberalisation
and deregulation of the
Indian economy in 1991
and especially in the
new millennium, a large
number of private liberal
arts universities have
captured the imagination
of India's fast-expanding
middle class

historic mistake of post-
independence India’s
national development
A effort was continuous
neglect of liberal arts and humani- Jindal Global University's Dr. Raj Kumar (left): valuable endorsement
ties in higher education. With the
Nehruvian economy development and contemporary curriculums have sufficiently well-known — a large
model according primacy to construc- been promoted through states-level number of them are unaware of the
tion of large infrastructure projects, legislation. Within the short time, virtues of advertising and brand
and production of core industry goods these private liberal arts universities building — the EW league table of
(coal, steel, fertiliser, petroleum etc), have captured the imagination of private liberal arts and humanities
education of aspiring engineers and India’s fast-expanding middle class. universities has been dominated
scientists was given high importance Although by standards of the by the Sonipat (Haryana)-based
to the relative neglect of liberal arts handful of government show-piece O.P. Jindal Global University
and the humanities. universities, their tuition fees are (estb.2009), especially since its
This infirmity of Indian higher high, with India’s banks having belat- highly competitive neighbour Ashoka
education persists to this day. Only edly introduced long-term education University, Sonipat (estb.2014) has
recently, the National Education loans, the demand for admission been moved to the multi-disciplinary
Policy (NEP) 2020 has directed into the country’s new genre private category where it has been ranked a
that all institutions of higher educa- liberal arts HEIs has soared with the creditable #3 for the past three years
tion must gradually transform into application-admission ratio averaging (see p.48).
multidisciplinary universities, and 10:1 for top-ranked universities which In this year’s EWIHER 2025-26
all students in higher education must are going great guns and increasingly there’s been minimal change in the
compulsorily study liberal arts and competing with American Ivy league seating order of the cosy top table of
science subjects in the first of four universities — traditionally favoured private liberal arts and humanities
years in undergrad education. by India’s elite and upper middle varsities. As last year, JGU is followed
Following liberalisation and dereg- class students. by the low-profile Pune-based
ulation of the Indian economy in 1991 And since 2022 when the FLAME University. The less visible
and especially in the new millennium, composite league table of private Ahmedabad-based Anant National
a number of private liberal arts uni- universities was sub-divided University has been promoted to
versities with globally benchmarked according to subject specialisation, the Top 3 by the 2025-26 sample
infrastructure, highly-qualified faculty the as yet small league table of respondents, trading places with

68 EDUCATIONWORLD APRIL 2025