Although new genre globally benchmarked private universities endowed with glitz and glamour have captured the public imagination in the new millennium, of the country’s 1,399 universities, 741 are government — 257 Central and 484 state and 552 are privately promoted. Government universities enroll a disproportionately large share of the country’s tertiary student population. India’s 741 government varsities teach 74 percent of the 43.3 million youth enrolled in the country’s higher education system (cf. 26.3 percent of youth enrolled in private universities). However within the public higher ed system, a mere 57 Central and 42 deemed universities well-funded by the Centre, offer acceptable high-quality education. The remaining 484 state universities are overstretched, underfunded, plagued with faculty shortages and burdened with administering an average 500 affiliated colleges. Driven by awareness of the vital nation-building importance of tertiary education, in 2020, the annual EducationWorld India Higher Education Rankings, which hitherto ranked only privately…