In science and engineering, notable alumni of the university include Padmanabhan Balaram, chemist and director of the Indian Institute of Science; Kantilal Mardia, statistician and Guy Medallists; Thomas Kailath, electrical engineer and recipient of the 2014 National Medal of Science; Vistasp Karbhari, civil engineer and the eighth president of the University of Texas at Arlington; Suhas Patankar, professor at the University of Minnesota, and pioneer in the field of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and finite volume method; C. Kumar N. Patel, inventor of the carbon dioxide laser, recipient of the 1996 National Medal of Science and vice-Chancellor for Research at the University of California, Los Angeles; and Vinod Scaria, bioinformatician, who is known for sequencing the first Indian genome. S. Huzurbazar served as the first head of the statistics department. S.N. Sadasivan who was Civil Services trainer, Author and historian. Other alumni include Ashutosh Agashe, businessman-cricketer, Bollywood actor Kay Kay Menon, Politician K. T. Rama Rao, Gulshan Kumar Bajwa, Social activist against corruption, and Pushkar Mukewar, Entrepreneur, & Co-Founder of Drip Capital. Savitribai Phule Pune University was ranked 601-800 in the world by the "Times Higher Education World University Rankings" of 2020, as well as 135 in Asia and 128 among Emerging Economies University Rankings in 2020. The QS World University Rankings of 2020 ranked it 191 in Asia in 2020 and 100 among universities in BRICS nations in 2019. It was ranked 19 in India overall by the "National Institutional Ranking Framework" in 2020 and 9th among universities. In the Khelo India University Games in Odisha, Savitribai Phule Pune University was on top with 29 medals including fifteen gold, eight silver and six bronze medals on the fifth day on 26 February 2020. Savitribai Phule Pune University’s Joyita Sarkar was one of the 21 people and the only one from an educational institute in the state to be awarded by President Ramnath Kovind for her role in science communication and popularisation on the National Science Day in New Delhi. Four students from the Savitribai Phule Pune University’s (SPPU) competitive exams centre have stood first in the state in their respective categories for Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) civil services exams for sales tax inspector.