Now Crisil, Icra to rate engineering, B-schools (Livemint Engineering Colleges Tamil Nadu)

In terms of circulation and advertising revenue—it was only going to be a matter of time before professional rating agencies got into the act.

Crisil Ltd and Icra Ltd have started rating the programmes offered by business and engineering schools. While Crisil rates only business schools, Icra rates both. Crisil has graded 39 B-school programmes across 28 institutes, while Icra has rated 13 B-schools programmes.

Engineering Colleges Tamil Nadu

“Since we are already into corporate debt rating, we explored another vertical,” said Rohit Inamdar, senior vice-president and co-head, corporate sector rating at Icra. “In three-four years we can have 30% of the addressable market,” he added.

Best Engineering Colleges

India has at least 3,900 business schools and 4,000 engineering colleges. The ratings are certain to help students choose schools carefully, say analysts.

Around 1.5 million students enter engineering colleges across India every year and 350,000 go to business schools, but the quality of many of the institutions remains a suspect.

At least 138 professional colleges offering programmes in management, engineering and computer application streams have applied to the All India Council for Technical Education, the apex technical education regulator, for permission to shut shop, citing low admission rates and poor campus placement, Mint reported on 25 March.

Much like ratings of corporate financial instruments, the ratings of business and engineering schools are “solicited” but “independent and neutral”, Inamdar said. The agencies rate the programmes on parameters such as curriculum, infrastructure and placements. The schools pay for the ratings.

A Crisil spokesperson said in an email that such ratings add to a school’s credibility: “It provides stakeholders with reliable information about the school, increases their confidence in the school and helps the school acquire strong brand equity.”