Are Sustainability development rankings relevant to universities in India?

In the last few years, sustainability has emerged as a critical priority for mankind, all over the world. Global ranking agencies like the Times Higher Education (THE) and the QS have been ranking World Universities for Sustainability. 

In the last two years, the number of Indian Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs), participating in these rankings, has more than doubled, reflecting the popularity of these Rankings. The Ministry of Education, Government of India introduced Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), as a sub-parameter for overall rankings for the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2024. In NIRF-2025, SDG, as a new category, was introduced for ranking of institutions.

Concerns are, however, expressed by several people, on the relevance of these rankings for the HEIs in India. Only one of the 17 SDGs, Quality of Education (SDG-4), is directly concerned with education. Besides, HEIs do not have any active role in either causing or controlling the rest of the sustainability issues.

In such a situation, the questions that arise are: how does participation in SDG rankings help the major stakeholders like students, teachers, the HEIs, or for that matter, the society, at large? Is it yet another case of commercialisation of rankings? In this context, this article examines the origin of these rankings, potential benefits, participation, and performance of Indian universities in major global sustainability rankings over the last three years, challenges faced by the institutions, and suggests the way forward.

U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals and role of HEIs

The origin of sustainable development rankings can be traced to the increasing focus on global climate action and the adoption by the United Nations, in 2015, of the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to be achieved by 2030. It is a global call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity. They address the major global economic, environmental, and societal challenges, related to poverty, education, health, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace, and justice.

Although all the SDGs are not focused directly on higher education, HEIs, as the knowledge creation and dissemination hubs, were identified as the critical players, in advancing these goals through education, research, and community outreach. The universities are expected to prepare students for a sustainable future, by incorporating the principles of Sustainability and Green Skills in the curricula of all the programmes. 

A number of career opportunities are emerging in Sustainability Sectors like Renewable Energy, Sustainable Agriculture, Urban Planning and Infrastructure, Waste Management, and Circular Economy. In addition, the universities are expected to take up inter-disciplinary research so as to address the real-life sustainability problems and publish the findings in journals. They should also build awareness in the society on the SDGs, by demonstrating their practice of sustainability in their campuses.

Global sustainability development rankings

In order to encourage and reward the HEIs to integrate the delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) into education and research, the United Nations launched the Higher Education Sustainability Initiative (HESI), which was supported by global ranking agencies like QS and Times Higher Education.

Recognising this, ranking agencies have started to evaluate institutions based on their contributions to the SDGs, alongside traditional metrics like academic reputation, research output, and teaching quality. HESI also has been facilitating academic publishers in promoting the SDGs among editors and authors.

UI GreenMetric World University Ranking

UI GreenMetric World University Rankings, initiated by Universitas Indonesia in 2010, even before SDGs were established, evaluates universities based on their environmental sustainability efforts, including energy use, waste management, and green infrastructure.

The UI GreenMetric evaluates university’s policy and on environmental sustainability performance, on the basis of six criteria: setting and infrastructure, energy and climate change, waste management, water use, transportation, and education. It is focused primarily on environmental sustainability, with less emphasis on social and economic aspects.

Times Higher Education Impact Rankings

Launched in 2019, the Times Higher Education (THE) Impact Rankings evaluate universities, based on their contributions to the individual SDGs, across four broad areas: research, stewardship, outreach, and teaching, by way of response to 15-20 different questions for each SDG. Participation in the overall ranking requires universities to submit data, along with evidence, for at least four SDGs , one of which must be the SDG 1 , partnerships for the goals.

Universities receive a score and a rank for their activities in each of the SDGs for which they submit data, besides an overall rank. The Rankings are open to any university that teaches at either undergraduate or postgraduate level. They were designed to encourage, as many universities as possible, to participate, by limiting the amount of data required for participation. In the last 2 years ,there has been a 60% growth in the number of global participants to reach 2,540 .

QS world university rankings for Sustainability

Introduced in 2023, QS rankings for Sustainability evaluate universities based on 53 sub-parameters, categorized under environmental impact (of environmental education, research and sustainability), social impact (education, health, employability ,equality and knowledge sharing) and governance ( good governance practices).

In order to be eligible for the Sustainability Rankings, an institution must be eligible for at least one of the QS rankings (global, by region, or by subject). Business Schools are not currently eligible to participate. It captures data on energy consumption, water consumption, and carbon emissions in the campus. It uses technology tools to assess the knowledge of staff and students on sustainability. Though it is the most recent one to get into SD rankings, the number of participating universities grew by 149% in the last two years to reach 1,743 in 2025.

Genesis of SDG rankings in India

During the Group of 20 countries (G20) meet in India in 2023, an action plan was drawn up to accelerate Progress on the SDGs in G20 countries. In line with the G20 Mission of LiFE (Lifestyle for Environment), criteria related to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were introduced, for the first time , to rank institutions under the Overall category for NIRF-2024. For NIRF-2025 rankings, SDG, as a new category, was introduced.

NIRF SDG rankings-2025 seeks to capture quantitative data on the environment, for the last 3 years, covering aspects like green area in the campus, consumption of water, energy, air quality, waste generation, food waste, and more. Besides, it captures qualitative data on sustainable living practices, covering initiatives and programmes of the university in areas like elimination of plastics, reduction of carbon footprint, renewable energies, tree plantation, addressal of social issues, minimization of food waste, sustainable transportation, and more.

Participation of Indian HEIs in global sustainability rankings

Over the last two years, the number of Indian HEIs participating in global sustainability rankings has grown significantly. Participation in THE impact ranking has more than doubled to 148 institutions, whereas in the case of QS Sustainability rankings, it grew five fold to 77 universities. Though it is the earliest to start SD ranking, number of participating universities UI GreenMetric Rankings from India has grown only by 11% in the last 3 years.

Are sustainability rankings evaluating the real contribution of universities to SD Goals?

The impact rankings focus on contribution of a university on each of the SDGs , covering policies, practices and outputs, along with evidence. QS rankings evaluate the environmental and the social impact of the initiatives of the university and the governance practices but does not map with each SDG.

A cursory study of data captured by the first edition of the NIRF SDG Rankings 2025, however, covers infrastructural inputs quantitatively and initiatives to address SDGs qualitatively. The collection of relevant data on the academic and research contribution of the university and their impact on achieving the SDGs seems to receive less priority when compared with infrastructural inputs.

It is not yet known how the data will be analysed to arrive at the ranks, as the methodology is not yet communicated in the public domain. NIRF methodology for SDG rankings seems to be contextually relevant but lacks the depth and rigor of global ranking frameworks, in terms of collection of relevant data, evidence for validation, evaluation of impact and analysis of the data to arrive at the rankings. In the absence of such a comprehensive framework and transparent communication, there could be possibilities of green washing, during submission of the data, particularly on the infrastructural inputs, thereby defeating the purpose of the rankings.

Challenges faced by Indian HEIs while participating in sustainability rankings

Currently, most of the institutions lack robust systems to collect the infrastructural / utilities data like green area in the campus, consumption of water, energy ,air quality ,waste generation, food waste etc, as they are not part of the academic processes of the university. While the HEIs have been investing on academic infrastructure, most of them, particularly the state government funded universities, lack financial resources to spend on SDG initiatives like renewable energy, waste water recycling, sustainable transportation etc. In this process, these rankings do not offer a level playing field, for all the participating institutions.

How to make the sustainability rankings more viable and relevant to the universities?

The sustainability rankings need to focus more on what HEIs can contribute to SDGs, as a part of their day-to-day operations, like sustainability education , interdisciplinary research to address SD issues and dissemination of the same by way of publications and societal outreach to build awareness on SDGs .

HEIs may be allowed to focus on specific SDGs, identify problem areas, therein and find solutions ,implement them on a pilot basis and provide details of the same , as a real life case study, as a part of the data capture. The Indian Knowledge System (IKS) offer a wealth of traditional knowledge to address the contemporary global challenges and achieve the SDGs cost effectively. The universities must be encouraged to integrate the IKS , as a part of their interdisciplinary research, to address the specific sustainability issues.

The evaluation framework may be designed to capture not only inputs but also outcomes and impact of the same for furtherance of the SDGs, supported by verifiable evidence.

The way forward

The year 2024 was the hottest year, in India, in the recorded history and over 40,000 heat stroke cases were reported and 2025 is expected to be worse. It underlines the urgent need for focusing on SDGs, which calls for concerted efforts by all. Universities can contribute immensely in this endeavor. The sustainability rankings can go a long way in encouraging them to do so, provided they focus on evaluating their knowledge contribution and the impact thereon , on the society. Otherwise, the rankings may merely become one more set of numbers, without a societal purpose.

(Dr O.R.S Rao is the Chancellor of the ICFAI University, Sikkim. Views are personal)