India's higher education system is the third largest in the world, next to the United States and China. The main governing body at the tertiary level is the University Grants Commission, which enforces its standards, advises the government, and helps coordinate between the centre and the state. Accreditation for higher learning is overseen by 15 autonomous institutions established by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
As per the latest 2011 Census, about 8.15% (98.615 million) of Indians are graduates, with Union Territories of Chandigarh and Delhi topping the list with 24.65% and 22.56% of their population being graduates respectively. Indian higher education system has expanded at a fast pace by adding nearly 20,000 colleges and more than 8 million students in a decade from 2000–01 to 2010–11. As of 2020, India has over 1000 universities, with a break up of 54 central universities, 416 state universities, 125 deemed universities, 361 private universities, 7 Institute under State Legislature Act, and 159 Institutes of National Importance which include IIMs, AIIMS, IITs, IIITs, IISERs and NITs among others. Other institutions include 52,627 colleges as government degree colleges, private colleges, standalone institutes and post-graduate research institutions, functioning under these universities as reported by the MHRD in 2020. Colleges may be Autonomous, i.e. empowered to examine their own degrees, up to PhD level in some cases, or non-autonomous, in which case their examinations are under the supervision of the university to which they are affiliated; in either case, however, degrees are awarded in the name of the university rather than the college.
The emphasis in the tertiary level of education lies on science and technology. Indian educational institutions by 2004 consisted of many technology institutes. Distance learning and open education is also a feature of the Indian higher education system, and is looked after by the Distance Education Council. Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) is the largest university in the world by number of students, having approximately 3.5 million students across the globe.
Some institutions of India, such as the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS), National Institutes of Technology (NITs), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISERs), Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), University of Delhi, University of Calcutta, University of Madras, Jawaharlal Nehru University have been globally acclaimed for their standard of education. However, Indian universities still lag behind universities such as Harvard, Cambridge, and Oxford.
Indian higher education is radical in terms accessibility, and needs radical reforms in standards, giving value, and pacing. A focus on enforcing both streamlining and holding higher standards of curriculum with the help of international academic publishers for transparency, making the vocational and doctoral education pipeline value-oriented and innovative, personalisation of the sector for students to gain immediate and valid transferable credentials in their own pace (e.g., Massive open online course, digital learning, etc.), empowering students to enter the work-force through exit and re-entry options with necessary building blocks of knowledge that leads to a skill/set of skills from a single or multiple academic fields (with required chains of knowledge), instituting stronger institutional responsibility in services for reprioritizing service delivery and working around the complexities, working with international standardization agencies to ensure students are getting value out of the programs, etc are the basic changes needed for gaining international and national competency. The rise of international centers and conglomerates of educational leadership's has given this forefront institutions and publishers a constitutive role for ascribing what is considered as legitimate knowledge from a foucauldian 'regime of truth' perspective, and hence to maintain international competency, ties with international sources of legitimacy is required. The rise of interest in IT sector, and engineering education in India has boxed students with crammed knowledge that gives them lesser chance to explore and develop their passions with modern elements of education such as co-operative education, work-based training, etc. Elective pathways to liberal arts education are also needed for broadening student passions, choices, and concerted/ natural personal growth.
