India, Sept. 14 -- Chandrakant Patil, Maharashtra's higher and technical education minister, said that immediate steps should be taken to check decline in rankings of institutions across Maharashtra after the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2025 results released by the Centre. The ranking of premier academic institution Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) dropped from 37 in 2024 to 91 in 2025 in the overall category.

At a review meeting chaired by Patil and attended by vice-chancellors of all state universities and senior officials, including principal secretary (higher education) Venugopal Reddy, on Friday, the minister said that "vacant professor posts are affecting universities' performance in rankings" and profess...