KARACHI: It is a great pity that, as in previous years, no national university has failed to make it to the world rankings of the best universities in the world. In the new ranking of universities for 2021 released by the leading British institution QS, not a single Pakistani university is among the top 350 universities in the world, while 3 universities in India, 5 in Malaysia, 6 in China and 2 in Saudi Arabia are among the 200 best universities in the world. Only three Pakistani universities have made it into the top 500 universities in the world, including the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST), Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences Islamabad and Quaid-e-Azam University, ranked 355th, 373rd and 454th respectively. The US Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) ranks first in the world. It has been number one for nine consecutive years. Stanford is second, Harvard is third, the California Institute of Technology is fourth and Oxford University is fifth. This sector has been in demand. However, education is a sector which cannot be given entirely in private ownership but requires government patronage. In developed countries, government grants are allocated for new research and inventions, while in our country, the education sector is the first. There is no significant share in the budget for the government, but the small grants that were given are now being cut. In such a situation, how will our educational institutions be able to achieve a prominent position in the world.