Ashoka University’s Economics Department ranked first in India by RePEc

It is with delight that Ashoka announces its Economics Department has been ranked first in terms of research excellence in India by RePEc (Research Papers in Economics), in their September 2020 rankings.  

RePEc is an internationally acclaimed collaborative effort of hundreds of volunteers in 102 countries to enhance the dissemination of research in Economics and related sciences. The heart of the project is a decentralized bibliographic database of working papers, journal articles, books, books chapters and software components, all maintained by volunteers. The collected data are then used in various services that serve the collected metadata to users or enhance it.  

The Economics Department of Ashoka University (Ashoka Econ) has been ranked at number 1 (#1 of 239 institutions) in India, and in the top 12.5% in Asia (at #31 of 1539 institutions) in September 2020, according to the international database RePEc, which covers 8198 institutions and 60355 registered authors worldwide. 

 The ranking reflects both the volume as well as reach of the research output of the department. The RePEc database for Asia has 1539 institutions with 6696 authors. More details can be found here. 

  Commenting on the significance of the ranking at what it means for the University, Vice-Chancellor Malabika Sarkar said,

“It is a significant achievement for us at the University. Ashoka is young, and for our Economics Department to have reached this level of recognition in India in such a short span of time is a testament to our belief in excellence. We take pride in the high quality of research in the Economics Department and are confident that this accomplishment will inspire others across the University.” 

 The Department has been at the forefront in research, especially in the times of COVID-19. 

 Ratul Lahkar, Head of the Department and Professor of Economics said, “We in the Economics Department are delighted that RePEc has ranked us the number 1 economics department in India. This ranking is based on the research output of the department and is a testament to our commitment towards excellence in research. It is particularly heartening to us that we have been able to secure this ranking despite being a relatively young department. We remain committed to striving for further excellence in this respect in the future.”

When asked about the parameters of assessment for the ranking, Professor Lahkar said, 

“Volume as well as reach of the research output of the department, since it takes into account total publications, number of citations, and number of downloads of research papers of registered authors.” 

 The complete list of ranking can be found here.