Comments on: IITs: What have you done for India?

By: bloodybrain

bloodybrain — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 11:38:10 +0000

Yes i believe it and yeah IITians have done “something” but not MUCH.. SO net is a loss rather than a profit..
I cudnt get into an IIT because i had no coaching for 1 year and yeah competing against lakhs,majority of them from KOTa, Delhi’z coachings, is not really easy..
DEy say IIT is a mind game,But do you think a guy with brains can compete with d one studying for 15-18 hours..?
And also MAyb we can prevent them from going abroad by just allowing them for studies rather than jobs..

By: Venkatesh Sridhar

Venkatesh Sridhar — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 12:54:05 +0000

Please Note that my post is not a dig at IITians but primarily at IITs as an institution.

By: Dipanjan

Dipanjan — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 07:09:51 +0000

Well, I have a slightly different opinion about this issue you’ve raised, and by far the nail hasn’t dug deep enough into the coffin.
Firstly, de-subsidising IIT education is a very bad idea, considering that the step was taken for the thousands of poor, backward and down-trodden students who have the brilliance and deserve to uplift themselves and their families given an opportunity to quality education and training. The best case is of Alok in Chetan Bhagat’s famous novel “5-point someone”, and besides hundreds of such students are awarded scholarships by the IIT’s themselves to further reduce their expenses.
The existence of IIT’s themselves gives them a much required hope and a guarantee to a secure future; and if there’s a need for something it is to build more such institutes which can give those millions of under-facilitated students to come up and use their talents, and I’m not talking of more IIT’s or engineering colleges, let there be more science, arts and commerce colleges which can maintain high-standards and ensure quality.
And to think that denying IIT’s the elitism they deserve and deliberately reducing them to other private colleges’ levels will help the nation in any way is just childish….come on!! we live in a globalized country now, those IIT alumni you accuse of brain drain will fly off to USA and UK universities after their higher secondary itself. Thats hardly going to help the nation.
If we are concerned about brain drain and all that stuff, we must understand that its simple economics of demand and supply and prices. Its wrong to expect all of them to build opportunities here rather than use an already existing one somewhere else…and though we need more people like Narayana Murthy, Nandan Nilekani etc. who choose to do so, we must understand that the underlying problem causing brain drain, low research outputs are much more basic and they make vicious circle of many more challenges.
But one point, which I do agree upon is the absence of any substantial research from these elite institutes, but then again IIT’s have always been engineering institutes catering to the industry, and this I do agree should be reformed, but the methods mentioned are not at all helpful.

By: GOPAL

GOPAL — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 04:05:46 +0000

thIS blog was like hittin nail in the head, it should come as headlines in National Newspapers, so that people ignorant of IIT’s zero-achievement & having a big pic abt it would come to know the reality, & the hype it created in India, esp for a school goin child like me yrs back wouldn,t have happened. Also i wouldn’t have felt very bad in not clearing the IIT Mains, after all, i m fighting with a 5 lakh population……& the research over there is poor. IIT’s hold their superiority only in conducting entrance examinations ONLY.
Tha fact ppl write IIT entrance at +2 is for fat salary packages & passport for US……..1.NOT FOR CONTINUING RESEARCH or 2. contributing to the country, …. at least we can leave the latter(2.), but the former(1.) is most impt.

IT’S VERY IMPT. THAT EVERY CHILD IN INDIA(esp +2 KIDS) STUDY THIS ARTICLE & GET A BIGGER PIC, instead of having a closed mind & worrying for not makin to the IITs

By: aravindsr (Aravind S Raamkumar)

aravindsr (Aravind S Raamkumar) — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 01:30:39 +0000

Interesting blog on IITs ~ http://www.venkateshsridhar.co.....for-india/

By: liberalcynic

liberalcynic — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:01:00 +0000

Could not have put it better myself, and I thought I was passionate on this topic! Indian taxpayers have the right to question the accountability (or lack thereof) of the subsidization of IIT education. I feel that instead of causing reform in IIT, we should cut off the funding, and make it a lot easier to open and run private colleges in India. In Bombay (middle finger to Raj Thackeray!), there are so many private colleges, but they are owned by plutocrats for who else can subvert the rules, appease the mafia, and set up a university?
Ideally, Indian government should not be involved in baccalaureate education at all except for the bare minimum. Let private colleges open easily, and they will do some great stuff. Any organization, when large enough, becomes sluggish. The government is the best example of that. India should concentrate on making many good engineers, instead of a handful of brilliant ones.

By: pavi

pavi — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 19:32:08 +0000

You are absolutely right… I in fact bumped into your article after a google search titled, “why so little research is done in india”. At least there is ‘some’ research done in the engineering fields. I study the social sciences and it is very sad that almost ‘NO’ research is done in my field of work. When in fact, social sciences research should be the first step to solve all our social and economic problems. Very sad indeed Especially when we have an economist for a prime minister I should probably do a research project on why so little research is done in India!

By: SHERIYAR

SHERIYAR — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:40:45 +0000

I think India has done very well with the IITs – the graduates are certainly employable both in India and abroad. They could get more funding via their alumni. The IITs are a credit to India.

By: Jayraj

Jayraj — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:38:55 +0000

I don’t like the IITs for one reason: elitism. As long as IITs are given preferential treatment, there will always be 2 (or 3 if you count the RECs) tiers in engineering education. Education should also be shaped by competitive forces; it isn’t good for one set of institutions to always remain pre-eminent.

There’s no reason why a regular university (eg. University of Mumbai) cannot have a program that is just as highly rated as IIT. All that’s lacking is the money, the teaching talent and the infrastructure. There are plenty of students who are of IIT calibre but don’t get in because of a bad day on the day of the JEE.

I also think that the other universities should seriously try and catch up with the IITs. Respect is good; giving up pre-eminent status to one institution without even trying is harmful.