Indian Institute of Technology Madras
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| Motto | Siddhirbhavati Karmaja |
|---|---|
| Established | 1959 |
| Type | Education and Research Institution |
| Director | M. S. Ananth |
| Faculty | 360 |
| Undergraduates | 2,500 |
| Postgraduates | 2,000 |
| Location | Chennai, Tamil Nadu India |
| Campus | Urban, 2.5 km² of wooded land |
| Mascot | Gajendra Circle |
| Website | http://www.iitm.ac.in/ |
The Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) is an engineering university located in Adyar the southern part of Chennai city(formerly Madras), in Southern India.
Founded in 1959 with technical and financial assistance from the Government of the erstwhile West Germany, IIT Madras was third among currently seven Indian Institutes of Technology established by the Government of India, through an Act of Parliament, to provide world class education and research facilities in engineering and technology. The city Madras in which it is located in has been renamed as Chennai in 1997.
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[edit] General information
The IIT Madras is a residential institute located in 2.5 km² (620 acres) campus that was formerly part of adjoining Guindy National Park. IIT Madras has nearly 360 faculty, 4,000 students and 1,250 administrative & supporting staff. It has been growing from strength to strength ever since it obtained its charter from the Indian Parliament in 1961 and has established itself as a premier centre for teaching, research and industrial consultancy in the country.
The Institute has 15 academic departments and a few advanced research centres in various disciplines of engineering and pure sciences, with nearly 100 laboratories organised in a unique pattern of functioning. The IITs are rated among the finest educational institutions in the world in terms of peer-ranking.
The campus is located in the city of Chennai, previously known as Madras. Chennai is the state capital of Tamilnadu, a southern state in India. Most of the campus is protected forest, and has a large population of chital (spotted deer) and black buck.
[edit] History
In 1956, the German Government offered technical assistance for establishing an institute of higher education in engineering in India. The first Indo-German agreement in Bonn, West Germany for the establishment of the Indian Institute of Technology at Madras was signed in 1959. IIT Madras was started with technical, academic and financial assistance from the Government of Germany; and at the time was the largest educational project sponsored by the German Government outside Germany. This has led to several collaborative research efforts with universities and institutions in Germany over the years.[1] Although official support from the German government has ended, several research efforts involving the DAAD program and Humboldt Fellowships exist.
The Institute was formally inaugurated in 1959 by Prof. Humayun Kabir, the then Union Minister for Scientific Research and Cultural Affairs. In 1961, the IITs were declared to be institutions of national importance. The IIT system has seven Institutes of Technology located at Kharagpur (estb. 1951), Mumbai (estb. 1958), Chennai (estb. 1959), Kanpur (estb. 1959), Delhi (estb. 1961), Guwahati (estb. 1994) and Roorkee (estb. 1847, upgraded to an IIT in 2001).
[edit] Campus
The main gate of IIT Madras is located in Chennai's Sardar Patel Road and is flanked by the posh residential areas of Adyar, and Velachery. The campus is close to the Raj Bhavan, the residence of the Governor of Tamilnadu. The land was carved out from the Guindy National Park, the smallest National Park in the country. IIT Madras is recognized as a separate postal zone (PIN 600036). There are small gates for IIT in Velachery, Gandhi Road and Tharamani.
The campus is 10 km from Chennai Airport and 12 km from Chennai Central Railway station and is well connected by buses.
Two parallel roads, Bonn Avenue and Delhi avenue, lead you through the residential zone, under a canopy of green, to Gajendra Circle (otherwise called GC) and the administrative block. Buses ply between the gate and other locations on campus at regular intervals. Named after mountains, the IITM buses and electric mini buses ply to and from the GC, academic zone and hostels for a nominal fare.
IITM is rich in flora and fauna and there are a large number of spotted deer, blackbucks and monkeys. There is a lake inside IITM, to where most of the rainwater inside IIT drains. This lake was deepened in the year 2003 to increase its capacity.
[edit] Organization
[edit] Administration
The Indian Institute of Technology, Madras is an autonomous statutory organization functioning within the Institute of Technology Act. The seven IITs (others being at Kharagpur, Kanpur, New Delhi, Mumbai, Guwahati and Roorkee) are administered centrally by the IIT Council, an apex body established by the Government of India. The Minister of Human Resource & Development, Government of India, is the Chairman of the Council. Each Institute has a Board of Governors responsible for its overall administration and control.
The Senate comprising all professors of the Institute decides the academic policy of the Institute. It controls and approves the curriculum, courses, examinations and results. It appoints committees to look into specific academic matters arising from time to time. The teaching, training and reseach activities of various departments of the Institute are periodically reviewed to improve faciliites and maintain standards. The Director of the Institute is the ex-officio Chairman of the Senate.
There are three Senate Sub-Committees, namely, Board of Academic Research, Board of Academic Courses and Board of Students to help academic administration and efficient functioning of the Institute. The Finance Committee advises on all financial policy matters while the builiding and Works Committee advises on matters relating to buildings and works activities. In addition, the Board of Industrial Consultancy & Sponsored Research and Library Advisory Committee advises on matters of industrial consultancy and library matters respectively.
[edit] Departments
IIT Madras has 11 Engineering Departments. They are:
- Aerospace Engineering
- Applied Mechanics
- Biotechnology
- Chemical Engineering
- Civil Engineering
- Computer Science and Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Engineering Design
- Mechanical Engineering
- Metallurgical and Materials Engineering
- Ocean Engineering
There are also five other departments, that include the following:
- Chemistry
- Mathematics
- Physics
- Humanities and Social Sciences
- Management Studies
[edit] Academics
IIT Madras offers undergraduate, postgraduate and research degrees in 15 disciplines in Engineering, Sciences, Humanities and Management. Around 360 faculty of international repute belonging to various science and engineering disciplines are engaged in teaching, research and consultancy activities here. The departments and centres of the Institute are responsible for the academic activities which include Teaching, Research and Industrial Counsultancy.
The courses of study are organized on semester programs and each semester provides for a minimum of seventy instructional days. The medium of instruction is English. Students are evaluated on a continuous basis throughout the semester. Evaluation is done by the faculty, a consequence of the autonomous status granted to the Institute. Research work is evaluated on the basis of the review thesis by peer examiners both from within the country and abroad. Ordinances in respect of the academic program of study are prepared by the senate, the highest academic body within the Institute.
[edit] Undergraduate academics
- Admission to Undergraduate Curriculum
JEE: The Joint Entrance Examination to the IITs is conducted every year and forms the basis of admission to the undergraduate programs. It is considered an extremely competitive exam.
HSEE: IIT Madras offers a unique and innovative Five Year Integrated Masters Programme, leading to M.A. degrees in 3 disciplines, viz., Development Studies Economics English Studies
- NCC/NSS/NSO
[edit] Graduate academics
- Admission to Graduate Curriculum
GATE: The Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering is the entrance exam used to govern admission to post graduate engineering programs at the IITs.
JAM: The Joint Admission to M.Sc. is the entrance exam used to govern admission to post graduate science programs at the IITs.
[edit] Management programme
- Admission to MBA Curriculum
JMET: The Joint Management Entrance Test is the entrance exam used to govern admission to the MBA programme at the IITs. It is followed by a group task & Personal Interview.
[edit] Credit system
As with the other IITs, IITM follows a credit system for evaluating academic performance. The GPA is on a scale of 0 to 10. Each course carries a certain number of credits (usually ranging from 1 to 4) and the following letter grades are awarded for each course:
| Letter Grade | S | A | B | C | D | E | U | W |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade Points | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 4 | 0 | 0 |
The GPA is computed as the cumulative credit-weighted average of the grade points:
where:
-
- N is the number of courses,
- Ci is credits for the ith course,
- GPi is grade points for the ith course, and,
- CGPA is the cumulative grade point average.
Presently, for courses in which a student got a failing grade and subsequently a passing grade, the failing grades are not used in computation of CGPA; these failing grades are also removed from the transcript and replaced by a footnote indicating the number of attemtps made to obtain the passing grade.
[edit] Other academic activities
[edit] Academic research programs
The Institute has several departments and advanced research centres in various disciplines of engineering and the pure sciences, with nearly 100 laboratories organised on a unique pattern of functioning. A faculty of international repute, a brilliant student community, excellent technical and supporting staff and an effective administration have all contributed to the pre-eminent status of IIT Madras.
These relate to research work undertaken by individual faculty or specific research groups in each departmnent running academic programmes leading to M.S or Ph. D degree. Research is carried out by scholars admitted to the programmes of study by research under the guidance of the faculty in each department.
Areas of interest for each department is made known to the academic community through handbooks, brochures andbulletins. Topics of interest include the theoretical studies as well as experimental areas and the resources and facilities available in the different laboratories are used. IIT Madras has initiated the following 16 inter-disciplinary research projects under the identified thrust areas.
The rigors of academic study at each level are balanced with a number of other related activities which include co-curricular activities. Special lectures on varied topic of academic relevance are held under the Extra Mural Lecture series.
A number of conferences, symposia and workshops are organized by the faculty which attract participation from scholars all over the world.
[edit] Partnership with other universities
The Institute maintains academic friendship with several other educational institutes in the world through faculty exchange programs. The Institute has signed Memoranda Of Understanding (MOUs) with several universities abroad, resulting in co-operative projects and assignments for mututal benefit.
The faculty of the Institute have distinguished themselves through awards for academic activity from national as well as international organizations.
[edit] Industrial consultancy and sponsored research
IIT Madras has set a fine example of interaction with the industry in the country, through consultancy services offered by the faculty. Innovative ideas are put to practice in many projects sponsored by other institutions in India.
Industrial Consultancy provides for faculty and staff of the institute to undertake specific assignments for the Industry, which may incude project design, testing and evaluation or even training in new areas of industrial development. Industries and organisations involved in the industrial development request IIT faculty to take up specific assignments channeled through the Center For Industrial Consultancy and sponsored Research (ICSR).
Organisation at the national level sponsor specific programs of research by funding projects undertaken by the faculty. Research of this kind is time bound but provides for those involved in the project to register for a degree. project proposals are usually prepared by IIT faculty and forwarded to various organisations based on the nature of research and the interest shown by Government/Research bodies to fund new projects.
Sponsored projects allow for new resources to be created in a department and often permit staff employed for the project to register for academic degrees in the institute. All Sponsored Research activities in the institute are coordinated by IC & SR.
[edit] Student activities
[edit] Hostels
Most students at IIT Madras live in the hostels, where a large number of extracurricular activities complement the hectic academic routine. The campus has 16 hostels, of which two (Sharavati and Sarayu) are exclusively occupied by girls. Before Sharavati was constructed, all the hostels had dining facilities attached; these mess halls have all been closed down. Sharavati and the four seven-storeyed mens' hostels do not have mess halls. Dining facilities are now provided in two large centralized halls dubbed 'mega mess' and 'giga mess'; the 'giga mess' formally has a name - Himalaya. Hostels in IITM may accommodate undergraduate and/or graduate students, though they tend to keep the two separate. Students are assigned to hostels by the Institute Administration after their fresher year, and usually spend the entire period of their stay in the Institute in the same hostel.
IIT Madras hostels are named after the principal rivers of India, and the buses that ply the campus are named after mountains. As a result, a common epigram about IIT Madras is that it is the only place where the mountains move and the rivers remain still.
The hostels of IITM currently are:
- Narmada
- Krishna
- Cauvery
- Brahmaputra
- Tapti
- Godavari
- Saraswati
- Jamuna
- Ganga
- Alakananda
- Mandakini
- Sharavati
- Sarayu
- Sindhu
- Pamba
- Tamraparani
- Mahanadi
Sindhu, Pamba and Tamaraparani were completed recently (2006) and a fourth similar one, Mahanadi, is expected to be completed during the 2006-'07 academic year. These four hostels are seven-storeyed whereas all the other (older) hostels are three- or four-storeyed (the older hostels were all three-storeyed till sometime in the late 1990's when extra rooms in the form of an extra floor and rooms above the common room were added).These four hostels can accomidate more than 1500 students.
[edit] Extracurricular activities
The cultural festival of the institute is known as Saarang, and the technical festival of the institute is known as Shaastra. The Open Air Theatre is the venue for the weekly Saturday night Film Club movies and other activities. It can seat over 7,000 people and usually plays to packed capacity.The annual inter-hostel sports event is known as the Schroeter.
Due to the fact that it's predominantly an engineering university, IIT Madras has an adverse male/female ratio, especially amongst its undergraduate students.
Like other large institutions, IIT Madras has colourful slang that is unique to itself. An eclectic mix of English, Hindi, Telugu and Tamil, the slang is also popular in other Chennai colleges. Even a Master's thesis has been published on the lingo of IIT Madras at a German University.
The campus has a few food joints within the campus. The Gurunath Patisserie is open until midnight on all days. Another, Tifanys, is open for even longer hours and offers mainly South Indian cuisine. A Cafe Coffee Day outlet has also started operation from the academic year 2006–07 onwards.
[edit] Facilities
IIT Madras provides accommodation to its faculty, administrative and supporting staff and their families in addition to students. It employs private caterers to meet the needs of a burgeoning student population. Banks (SBI,ICICI,Canara Bank), a hospital, shopping centres, food joints, and schools situated within the campus at IIT Madras make it self-contained.
[edit] Placements
The placements at IIT Madras are amongst the best in India, on par with other IITs. Many major national and international companies actively recruit students from this institute. [1]
Some undergraduate students from IIT Madras, however, opt for higher studies in technology, administration or management.
[edit] Famous alumni
[edit] Academics
- Dr. K.R. Rajagopal (University distinguished professor and Forsyth Chair in Engineering at Texas A&M University)
- Dr Marti G Subrahmanyam (Charles E. Merrill Professor of Finance at Stern School of Business)
- Dr Ananth Raman (UPS Foundation Professor of Business Logistics at Harvard Business School)
- Dr Kasturi Rangan (Malcolm P. McNair Professor of Marketing at Harvard Business School)
- Dr Subra Suresh (Ford Professor of Engineering at MIT)
- Dr Hari Balakrishnan (Professor at MIT)
- Dr Ramesh Govindan (Associate Professor at USC)
- Dr Venkat Guruswami (Assistant Professor at UW Seattle)
- Dr Anand Rajaraman (Assistant Professor at Stanford University)
- Dr Narayanaswami Ranganathan (Professor at Université François Rabelais de Tours)
- Dr R. Shankar, Chair, Dept of Physics, Yale University
[edit] Industry
- Gopalkrishnan S. (Co-Founder, Managing Director and COO of Infosys) [MS77 PH] [MT79 CS]
- Gururaj Deshpande (Founder of Sycamore Networks) [BT73 EE]
- Muthuraman B. (Managing Director of Tata Steel) [BT66 MT]
- Satish Pai (Vice President, Schlumberger Oilfield Technologies)
- Dr Mohan C. (IBM Fellow)
- B Santhanam (CEO Saint-Gobain India) [BT78 CV]
- Dr Krishna Bharat (Creator of Google News, Principal Scientist, Google)
- Phaneesh Murthy (Founder, iGate; Prior Worldwide Head of Sales and Marketing, & Board Member, Infosys)
- Sunil Wadhwani (Co-Chairman and CEO of iGate) [BT74 ME]
- Sreehari Narasipur (Vice President, Product Development, Telelogic India) [MT83 ME]
- Shivakumar D. (Vice-President and Country General Manager for Customer and Market operations, Nokia India) [BT82 AE]
- Hari T. N. (Vice President and Global Head of Human Resources, Virtusa Corp.) [BT86 ME]
- Dr. Jalaiah Unnam (Natl. Prime Contractor of the Year award by US Small Business Administration) [BT70 MT]
- K.N. Radhakrishnan (President, TVS Motor Company) [BT86 MT]
- Yogesh Kumar (Director of Light Combat Aircraft (LCA-Tejas) project, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited) [MT81 ME]
- Partha De Sarkar (CEO-IT and ITES, Hinduja TMT Ltd.) [BT88 MT]
- Sudarsun. S (Director R & D, Checktronix India Pvt Ltd.) [MT99 CS]
- Krishna Kolluri (Board of Directors, Nevis Networks; Executive VP at Juniper Networks) [BT86 ME]
- Srini Chari (President & CEO of TurboWorx) [BT81 ME]
- B.N Narasimha Murthy (Senior VP, Business Transition & Domestic Markets, of Hinduja TMT) [BT79 ME]
- Raj Srikanth (Managing Director, Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, New York, USA)
- Kalpathi S. Suresh (Chairman and CEO, SSi Ltd) [BT86 EE]
[edit] Others
- Rajinder Singh (Noted spiritual leader and winner of Colombia's highest award medal of golden cross, various U.N. awards and speaker in World Parliament of Religions) [BT67]
[edit] External links
- Official website
- IIT Madras Alumni in North America
- IIT Madras Alumni Association (IITMAA)
- PanIIT Alumni Organization
- IITIANS.com Links and more info
