Burden of being a brand

A vision to contribute to India and the world through excellence in scientific and technical education and research has seen the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi (IITD) growing by leaps and bounds during all these years. And, it goes to the institute''s credit of developing human potential to its fullest that for the first time in its convocation history, it invited senior partner worldwide, of Mckinsey and Company and an alumnus of IITD, Rajat Gupta as the chief guest, during the recently held 35th convocation.
Explaining the rationale behind inviting an alumnus to be the chief guest at the convocation, the director, IITD, R S Sirohi said: "Our purpose behind inviting Rajat Gupta was to expose students to the virtues of aiming big in life.And, there cannot be a better role model than Rajat Gupta who has made it big in the corporate world today."
This year saw 1,320 students graduating from IITD, at various levels of UG, PG, MBA and Ph D. A new M Tech programme on ''Radio Frequency and Technology'' with an intake of 37 students have commenced this year and another M Tech programme on transportation and engineering will start from August 2005. In the past one year, the institute has signed numerous MoUs with foreign universities and research institutions and received delegations from abroad who were looking for collaboration in the area of IT.
On the issue of increasing the intake at UG level, so as to give an opportunity to a large section of deserving candidates, who are unable to get through the final list, to get admission into IITD, Sirohi elaborated, "The present strength at IITD is 4,800 plus students at different levels. Teaching is an important but not a major component of IIT system. Our faculty is involved in multifarious activities such as research and development, consultancy, becoming member of committees of professional bodies, becoming member of editorial board of journals, writing books, developing contacts and working on new courses, among other activities. We can increase the intake; but in that case it will become difficult for the faculty to be engaged in any other activities but teaching."
Will opening up of new IITs ease the pressure as far as intake is concerned? Sirohi remarked, "IITs are known for their faculty and students. They receive continuous support from the Government of India. Apart from the regular intake, we can admit perhaps another 10,000 students from the merit list. However, the biggest problem we are facing today is the shortage of quality faculty which can manage these institutions." He pointed out that their selection criteria were so stringent that they were finding it difficult to attract people for the posts of professors, associate professors and assistant professors. Sirohi added, "For example, against an approved strength of 20 faculty members in the chemical engineering department, we only have 12. The same can be said about computer science and engineering department which is working at 60 per cent of its approved faculty strength."
Throwing more light on the faculty shortage, Sirohi said: "We can recruit our own Ph D degree holders but we believe in giving them an opportunity to go out and work on new challenges for the next few years. Later on, they can come back and contribute to the IIT system. The problem is that there aren''t enough people who are interested in teaching." According to him, one major reason for this could be the compensation package. He exclaimed, "We cannot compete with the private players. An assistant professor at IITD gets an annual emoluments of Rs 3 lakh a year plus other facilities like campus accommodation and permission to attend international conferences, with a grant upto Rs 1 lakh. Besides, a faculty member, irrespective of his or her experience gets a chance to go for industry experience- for research and development. We still find it difficult to attract the best faculty."
On future plans, Sirohi remarked, "The IIT system has to see what can be done to market ourselves abroad. The way we are functioning doesn''t give us scope to market IIT education, but we have to explore the option of going out to set up campuses abroad." He said IITs required to create infrastructure for research so that people from other countries could come and pursue research in the country. Sirohi added, "At present, 41 students from 13 countries are pursuing their programmes at IITD and we want this number to go up to 10 per cent of the total strength at IITD, to give it an international look. Moreover, we expect to churn out at least 160-180 Ph D graduates every year."