IIT awaits permanent faculty

Vikas Sharma

Tribune News Service

Jammu, October 26

No initiative has been taken so far for recruitment of permanent faculty of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Jammu even though the academic session has commenced at the temporary campus in the winter capital this year.

The academic session of the IIT was started in August at its transit campus set up at the KCS in Paloura. A total of 84 students had been enrolled against an intake capacity of 90 students for three courses.

The Indian Institute of Technology, Jammu, offered three courses in the initial phase, which were in the disciplines of computer science and engineering, electrical engineering and mechanical engineering.

Right now, IIT-Delhi was the mentor institute for IIT-Jammu, sources said. The latter had been following the curriculum of the former as it was yet to evolve its own curriculum, they pointed out.

They added that the faculty for academic programmes were from IIT-Delhi as no notification regarding recruitment of permanent faculty had been issued by IIT-Jammu.

“The state government is quick to demand the establishment of prestigious institutes, but when it comes to creating full-fledged infrastructure on time, it fails to take any initiative,” said the father of an aspirant.

“My son cracked the entrance examination to take admission at the IIT in Jammu, but we decided against his joining the institute,” he stated.

“The facilities at the temporary IIT campus are not of the same standard which is usually available at other Indian Institutes of Technology across the country,” he pointed out.

“I visited the site at Nagrota, where the IIT campus is being constructed, a month back. The work is going on at a snail’s pace,” he added.

“It will take more than seven years to complete the entire campus, which really shows how serious the authorities are about constructing prestigious institutes,” he rued.

Prof SK Koul, professor in charge, IIT-Jammu, said the construction of transit campus, spread over 25 acres within the actual site at Jagti village in Nagrota, was likely to be ready in time for the next session.

“After its establishment, the transit campus will accommodate around 600 students. At present, we have nine faculty members from IIT-Delhi to teach all 84 students,” he asserted.

He disclosed that recruitment of permanent faculty was likely to start from the next academic session with the introduction of a course in civil engineering.

A memorandum of understanding was signed by the Department of Higher Education and Human Resource Development Ministry on May 1 to start the 2016-17 session with IIT-Delhi as mentor.

Union Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javedkar inaugurated the transit campus of IIT-Jammu on August 5.