The 4,223 knowledgeable EW sample respondents have reconfirmed the new genre O.P. Jindal Global University (JGU, estb.2009) India’s #1 Liberal Arts and Humanities University. Sited on an 80-acre campus in Sonipat (Haryana), JGU is awarded top score on six of the ten parameters of higher education excellence including curriculum and pedagogy, research and innovation, leadership, internationalism, industry interface and faculty welfare and development.

Prof. C. Raj Kumar, the cheerful polymath Oxford and Harvard-educated founding vice chancellor of JGU, is delighted. “This is testament to our unwavering dedication to academic excellence, innovation, and social impact. At JGU, we are committed to playing a pivotal role in developing well-rounded, compassionate, and socially responsible graduates, who can competently tackle the multifaceted challenges of the 21st century,” says Raj Kumar.

Although JGU is currently a comprehensive law, liberal arts and humanities university which has received global acclaim (ranked India’s #1 private university by the London-based QS), it is mindful of NEP 2020’s mandate for all universities to transform into autonomous multidisciplinary higher education institutions (HEIs).

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“Our institutional objective is to first establish JGU as India’s most comprehensive law and liberal arts university. To that end, we have already established 12 inter-disciplinary schools — law, business, liberal arts and humanities, banking and finance, international affairs, government and public policy, etc — within JGU. Our long-term plan is to start STEM and medical schools though we can’t put a time-line on it as yet,” says Raj Kumar.

And on the subject of the imminent entry of foreign universities into India, Raj Kumar, who has first-hand experience of teaching-learning in the US, UK, Japan and Hong Kong, is unfazed. “Competition brings out the best in everyone, and we embrace it wholeheartedly,” he says.

See table below for the exclusive six-strong league table of India’s best liberal arts and humanities universities which offer US Ivy League-style curriculums.

Parameters of excellence: India’s Top 10 Private Universities (across all categories)

To compile the EW India Private University Rankings 2023-24, C fore field researchers interviewed 2,147 faculty, 1,310 final year students and 776 industry managers countrywide, asking them to rate institutions on ten parameters, viz, competence of faculty, faculty welfare and development, research and innovation, curriculum and pedagogy (digital readiness), industry interface, placements record, infrastructure and facilities, internationalism, leadership/governance quality and range/diversity of programmes offered. Further, the informed interviewees were asked to assign weightage to each parameter. The scores awarded by the respondents were totaled to rank India’s Top 10 private universities under each parameter of higher education excellence.

The ‘research and innovation’ parameter was assigned highest weightage (300) indicating that respondents believe that the ability of faculty to engage in meaningful research and development including publication of papers in reputed international journals, is the most important criterion for assessing the educational capabilities of universities. Parameter rankings which highlight the prime strengths of highly ranked institutions are useful because they enable students to select institutions whose priorities dovetail with their own.

The national ranking of Top 10 private universities under all ten parameters, are set out below.