As the readers know eight new IITs are being established in India. They are: IIT Bhubaneswar (mentored by IIT Kharagpur), IIT Hyderabad (mentored by IIT Madras), IIT Rajasthan (mentored by IIT Kanpur), IIT Bihar (mentored by IIT Guwahati), IIT Punjab (Mentored by IIT Delhi), IIT Gandhinagar (mentored by IIT Bombay), IIT Himachal Pradesh (mentored by IIT Roorkee) and IIT Indore (mentored by IIT Bombay). Of these the first six will start classes this year.
The following news mentions that of the six that will start classes this year, admission to IIT Bhubaneswar will start on July 23rd and classes will start immediately after that, while admission to the other IITs will start next month. (Note that classes at IITs start immediately after admission.) Big thanks to the mentor institution IIT Kharagpur for this. This action is in line with our arguments on advantages of IIT Bhubaneswar over the other new IITs. Following is an excerpt on this from a news item in Economic Times.
Admission to the Bhubaneswar IIT, which is among the six new ones to come up this year, will begin on July 23 at the Kharagpur IIT here, sources said.
120 students will get admission to the new IIT this year and Kharagpur IIT director Damodar Acharya will be its coordinator, they said.
Faculty will be exchanged between the two IITs as and when required and all cooperation and academic support will be extended by the Kharagpur IIT, which is the nearest, in the initial stages, the sources said.
Admission to the rest of the five new IITs would begin next month.
Following is an excerpt from Pioneer’s report on this.
"We will ensure that from day one students feel they are studying in an IIT," Professor Acharya said. The IIT Orissa was also registered under the Society Registration Act in the office of IG in Cuttack on Saturday.
Cabinet has today approved the setting up of eight new Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) in Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Orissa, Gujarat, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and at Indore in Madhya Pradesh at a total cost of Rs. 6080 crores (@ Rs. 760 crores per IIT) for 6 years period, and consequently approval for forming of Societies for creating legal entities for the new IITs. Academic sessions are going to commence in 6 new IITs starting from 23.7.2008. The IITs of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Gujarat are going to commence their classes for about 120 students each for B.Tech programmes through temporary campuses located near the place where the IIT campus is likely to be built. These 3 IITs of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Gujarat are going to be mentored by the IITs of Madras, Guwahati and Bombay, respectively. The three IITs of Rajasthan, Punjab and Orissa are going to commence their classes in the campuses of their mentor IITs at IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur, respectively.
The Cabinet has also approved the creation of 30 faculty posts per year in the first three years of establishment of each of the new IITs and have also specifically approved the post of a Director in each of the new IITs in the grade of Rs. 26,000 (fixed) and a post of Registrar in the grade of Rs. 16,400-22,400 for each of the new IITs. The Cabinet has also decided to raise the grade of all existing IIT Directors from Rs. 25,000 (fixed) to Rs. 26,000 (fixed).
The balance of two IITs at Indore in Madhya Pradesh and the IIT in Himachal Pradesh are likely to commence their sessions from the next academic year of 2009-10. All the State Governments have identified about 600 acres of land for the location of the new IITs. In case of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar, Govt. have accepted the site recommended by the State Govt. and in the rest of the cases, the Site Selection Committee will inspect the offered sites in due course and will give its recommendations to the Ministry.
With a view to ensure good effective coordination as well as maintenance of excellence in the new IITs also, pending selection of regular Directors for the IITs, it has been decided that the Directors of the mentor IITs will work as Directors of the mentored IIT and the Chairman of the Board of Governors (BoG) of the mentor IIT will also be the Chairman of the BoG of the mentored IIT.
With the creation of new IITs, high quality technical education will become accessible to more bright students as now hardly two percent of about three lakhs students who appear in the Joint Entrance Exam of IITs can get admission in them. The new IITs will also facilitate the increased output of high quality Engineering and Science graduates, postgraduates and Ph.D.s; Teachers for Engineering and Science subjects at College/University level and R&D and Intellectual Property generation in Engineering and Science.
Cabinet also approved in principle approval for taking over the Institute of Technology, Banaras Hindu University – a constituent unit of the Banaras Hindu University, a Central University, its conversion into an Indian Institute of Technology and integrating it with the IIT system in the country.
It would also address State/Region specific technology related problems of States/UTs situated in the IITs’ Zones.
The existing IITs that are handholding the new ones as “mentors” asked the Centre to postpone the launch of these institutes at a meeting yesterday. The government has agreed.
The three new institutes in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Gujarat — to be mentored by the IITs in Chennai, Guwahati and Mumbai respectively — will now open in August, or even later, instead of this month. They had earlier been scheduled to start classes at the same time as their mentor institutes in July.
Even when they open, these three will start classes on temporary campuses near their state capitals, using rented infrastructure, the sources said. “It’s impossible to start our own academic session and the classes at the new institutes at the same time,” an IIT director said.
“Since no faculty has been hired for them, our teachers would then have to go and teach at the new venues. The new IITs can only start once we have hired their faculty.”
The decision came at a meeting between the directors of the seven existing IITs and the human resource development (HRD) ministry in Delhi yesterday, the sources said. The directors asked the ministry to speed up the paperwork for the establishment of the new institutes.
“They don’t have even their own insignia or letter pad, and we are expected to start classes! Till they are registered, we can’t even hire teachers or issue call letters to the students,” another director said.
The ministry may approach the registrar of societies next week, sources said.
“We will try and register the institutes as soon as possible,” a senior ministry official said, admitting that bureaucratic lethargy was at fault.
Although registration will allow the new IITs to hold classes, the Centre needs to amend the IIT Act to formally recognise the degrees they would offer. A cabinet note seeking the amendment has been circulated among the ministries.
Classes for the students admitted to the three other new IITs — in Punjab, Orissa and Rajasthan — may also be delayed. Their classes are to be held at their mentor institutes in Delhi, Kharagpur and Kanpur this year.
“Our faculty members’ workload will increase,” a senior IIT Kharagpur official said, adding that no formal decision had yet been taken to delay the classes for the Orissa institute’s students.
Plans to launch an IIT in Himachal Pradesh this year were aborted after IIT Roorkee, its mentor, threw up its hands.
Many JEE qualified students may be wondering about the new IITs. In a series of articles we will talk about the IIT in Bhubaneswar and the advantages of the Bhubaneswar area.
Bhubaneswar has excellent connectivity by train, road and air. It has multiple daily direct trains to/from Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, a daily train to/from Mumbai, and trains to/from all corners of India (Guwahati, Kerala, Goa, Gujarat, Jaipur, Punjab, Haradwar, Kanpur, Lucknow, Benras, Patna, Raipur, Bhopal, etc.) It has direct train connections to all the old IITs (Bombay, Delhi, Madras, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Roorkee, and Guwahati).
Following is a map of Bhubaneswar’s railway connectivity.
The students admitted to IIT Bhubaneswar will be taking their first year classes at IIT Kharagpur, the oldest IIT. Most likely they will stay in the MMM Hall at IIT Kharagpur. They will be staying with the IIT Kharagpur students.
In contrast, the IIT Gujarat students are reported to start their classes at the Vishwakarma Government Engineering College campus at Chandkheda in Gandhinagar district where IIT Bombay has the extension center. They will be more prone to bring with them the culture, tradition and history of that govt. college. IIT Hyderabad students will have to start from scratch, as it is reported that their classes will be held in Isnapur near SangaReddy in Medak district, near Hyderabad.About the arrangements in IIT Rajasthan, Times of India has this to say: "Apartments of IIT-K’s guest house would be converted into hostels for students of IIT-Rajasthan. Classes and labs would be held in shifts. If IIT-K classes are held in the morning shift, IIT-R students would have to attend classes in the evening and similar arrangement would be made for labs".
The proposed IITs and their mentor institutions are IIT Gujarat/Gandhinagar (IIT Bombay), Punjab (IIT Delhi), Patna (IIT Guwahati), Rajasthan (IIT Kanpur), Bhubaneswar (IIT Kharagpur), and Hyderabad (IIT Madras). While all will offer electrical and mechanical engineering, IIT Gandhinagar will offer chemical engineering, IIT Bhubaneswar will offer civil engineering, and the rest will offer computer science and engineering.
“The curriculum, syllabus, fee structure and other rules for the new IITs will broadly remain the same as in the respective mentor IITs,” the IIT-B official said.
The first-year classes for IIT Punjab, Rajasthan, and Bhubaneswar will be conducted at the campuses of the mentor IITs. The students will be shifted to the respective locations in the second year. Classes for the other new IITs will be conducted in the cities where the IITs are being located.
“Consequent to the government of India issuing notification for the setting up of eight new IITs in the 11th Plan, admissions to three more new IITs in Punjab, Gujarat and Orissa, other than at Hyderabad, Patna and Rajasthan, for the academic session 2008-09 are likely to be made through JEE-2008,” said an official release.
… Counselling for admission begins on June 17 for the declared All-India rank holders. Courses allocated to the successful candidates will be declared on June 30.
“An extended merit list has also been drawn to facilitate admission to other government institutions. Students on the list might be counselled by the Indian Institute of Space-Science Technology, Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research and Rajeev Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology. The Indian Institute of Maritime Studies also offers admission based on JEE-2008 results,” said the release.
The Union ministry of human resources development, it is learnt, has given the nod to another three IITs to begin functioning from 2008-09. These are the IITs which are to be located in Orissa, Gujarat and Punjab.
So instead of the initial three IITs that were slated to begin functioning from the forthcoming academic session, the government has now decided to launch another three. A decision to this effect is reported to have been taken earlier this week and conveyed to the existing IITs that will act as their mentor institutes.
The three IITs that were initially expected to begin functioning from 2008-09 are the ones in Bihar, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.
… Punjab will have IIT-Delhi as its mentor institute while the one in Gujarat will have IIT Powai as its mentor. The one in Orissa will be mentored by IIT Kharagpur. As for the admissions to these three institutes, sources said no decision has been taken as yet on the numbers that will be admitted to each. However, they will be admitted on the basis of the joint entrance examination (JEE) that has already been held and whose results are yet to be announced, said ministry sources. In the case of the IITs in Bihar, Rajasthan and AP, each will be admitting 126 students for the 2008-09 session. No decision has been taken yet on the numbers that will be admitted to the IITs in Orissa, Punjab and Gujarat.
IIT in Punjab to be in Ropar (45 kms from Chandigarh) and classes will start this year. IIT Delhi will be the mentor institution: Times of India.
IIT Himachal will be mentored by IIT Roorkee. It is to be located in the Mandi district: myhimachal.com
IIT in Gujarat to be mentored by IIT Bombay. Classes will start this year at the Vishwakarma Government Engineering College campus at Chandkheda in Gandhinagar district where IIT Bombay has the extension center. This year 120 students will be admitted in the disciplines of Mechanical, Electrical and Chemical. It will be located in the Gandhinagar-Ahmedabad Knowledge Corridor: Hindu , Indian Express.
IT BHU on its way to get IIT tag. The is expected to take around a year with the government modifying the BHU Act 1915 in Parliament.: Business Standard.
IIT in Orissa rumored to be located near Bhubaneswar. No formal announcement has been made but the IIT Kharagpur officials have discussed with the CM regarding their preferences and the CM has written to MHRD to allow classes to start this year.
IIT in Rajasthan to be mentored by IIT Kanpur and classes will start this year. 120 students will be admitted in Electronics engineering, computer science and mechanical engineering. "Apartments of IIT-K’s guest house would be converted into hostels for students of IIT-Rajasthan. Classes and labs would be held in shifts. If IIT-K classes are held in the morning shift, IIT-R students would have to attend classes in the evening and similar arrangement would be made for labs"."Along with IIT-K, Prof Sanjay Govind Dhande would also be the director for IIT-R" : Times of India.
IIT Hyderabad would be mentored by IIT Chennai. : Times of India.
IIT Patna would be mentored by IIT Guwahati. : Times of India.
In the meantime, Orissa chief minister Naveen Patnaik too has written to the Centre requesting that the IIT which is to come up in his state should begin functioning from the 2008-09 academic session itself.
Following are more excerpts from that article about new IIT locations across India.
… the Union ministry of human resources development has written to the state government suggesting three cities. And none among the three is the location favoured by the Rajasthan government, Kota. Instead, the ministry has suggested that the IIT be located in either Jaipur, Jodhpur or Udaipur. The logic behind the ministry’s suggestion, said sources, is that it wants the IIT located in a city which has an airport or is at least in close proximity to an airport. While all the three cities suggested by the HRD ministry have an airport, Kota doesn’t have one. The closest airport is in Jaipur, some 240 km away.
… both the other two new IITs — in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh — fulfil this HRD ministry criteria. The one in Andhra Pradesh will be located in Isnapur near Sanga Reddy in Medak district and won’t be too far away from the twin-cities of Hyderabad-Secunderabad. … the new IIT which will come up in Bihar is located some 40 kilometres away from state capital Patna, which has an airport. These three IITs will begin admissions from the 2008-09 academic session itself, though they will be functioning from the already-established IITs.
Now the Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (IDCO) has been asked to identify the land. IDCO has identified 3 spots for the proposed IIT.
Interestingly last week only, the MHRD sent a letter to identify a land measuring 600 acres for the proposed IIT in the vicinity of Bhubaneswar, which will be directly accessible to the airport, railway and national highway.
Nearest to Bhubaneswar is a temple land near Jatni is available which is only 25 km from the capital city. This is approachable with railway and national highway. But snag is that only 400 acres of government land is available, so it may not be acceptable for IIT.
Second place is near Banki-Cuttack Road, which is around 65 km from Bhubaneswar. There is a patch of more than 2000 acres of government land. However the place is not directly connected with national highway, but it lies the side of a state highway.
Third one is in Tangi of Bhusandpur near Chilka. More than 4000 acres of land is available in the low lying areas of Chilka. It will be more than 70 km from Bhubaneswar. The place is picturesque and its scenic beauty is enchanting. The NH-6 5 is passing nearby the place.
Out of these 3 places, one will be chosen.
Experts are visiting the places and it will take much time to reach a final decision. How ever nothing prevents MHRD to declare IIT Kharagpur as the ‘mentor institution’ of IIT Orissa and start the classes from this education year. IIT Kharagpur needs 3-4 acre of land as it is having an extension centre at Bhubaneswar. Only 70,000 square feet is needed to begin the classes.
In regards to IIT Odisha, Prof. Damodar Acharya, who as IIT Kharagpur director will be in charge of IIT Odisha, recently visited and discussed with the CM of Orissa on the IIT issue. I was told that there was a news item in the local edition of Times of India that the IIT in Odisha will start classes this year with 120 students. This news has not appeared in any other place yet.
… IIT Bombay, which set up its extension centre at Government Engineering College (GEC), Chandkheda, six months ago, will support the state education department in the entire process of setting up full-fledged IIT here, including faculty recruitment. The IIT will function from GEC Chandkheda- the institute from where IIT Bombay currently conducts 12 short-term courses under its continuing education programme
According to Principal Secretary, education department, Hasmukh Adhia, "After the media came up with its report on the decision to set up an IIT in Gujarat, we received the letter from the union HRD ministry. To which we have expressed the ministry that we consists readymade infrastructure at GEC, Chandkheda, which fulfils all infrastructural requirements as asked by it, so we came to a conclusion to set up IIT".
Pointing out the grey areas Mr. Adhia, "We have the entire required infrastructure in place. But the only thing which is missing here is the hostel facility for students. GCE, Chandkheda has very excellent housing projects in place and the problem of hostel requirement will be easily sorted out".
The HRD ministry’s decision to set up four IITs each in Gujarat, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Punjab, comes months after finance minister P Chidambaram declaration during his budget speech about setting up IITs in Bihar, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan. Initially, the three states will kick-start IITs with 120 students each for three undergraduate programmes in Computer Science & Engineering, Electrical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering. IIT-G is to follow the same pattern as well.
So Orissa could get 18 colleges (in 18 districts) and 11 polytechnics. Each of these colleges would be supported by GOI by upto Rs. 2.5 Crore or one-third cost with the balance being met by the State Government or Private participation.
The Human Resource Development Ministry has asked the State Government to identify land for the proposed Indian Institute of Technology and the Central University (CU) announced by the Centre.
In a communique to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, the Ministry has requested for 700 acres of land free of cost near the Capital for setting up Central University. …
The contour and the shape of the institutions, however, will be defined shortly. The new IT IIT and the CU will be set up during the 11th Plan period.
