IIT Bombay should modify placement process, set up outreach campuses, suggests review panel

NEW DELHI : The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay needs to modify its placement process and outdated labs, improve infrastructure, restructure academic units and programmes, and promote postdoctoral programmes, suggested a review committee. The experts recommended establishing outreach campuses and a human resource welfare division.

Reviewers from India and abroad praised the institute for its recent innovations such as CAR-T Cell Therapy and endeavours in ensuring inclusivity and diversity in faculty recruitment. The reviewers suggested IITB to promote its postdoctoral programme.

IIT Bombay conducted an extensive review for the period 2018-2022 in two phases. Phase one saw specialized external committees examining the various academic units of the institute over a period of time in 2023 while phase two had an institutional review committee giving its inputs on the overall progress. The second phase of review was conducted from February 21 to 23 this year.

Not only did the committee members take a look at the infrastructure and interact with the students, faculty, staff, and alumni, they also made a visit to the laboratories, classrooms and startups of IIT Bombay.

Among the achievements of the institute in the past five years, that caught the attention of observers, are increased student enrolment , higher graduation rate, high-quality research publications, funded projects, technology hubs, research parks, national missions, and alumni-funded programmes.

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Representation of reserved categories

The reviewers noted that IIT Bombay has been making efforts to appoint faculty members from the reserved categories through special recruitment drives. “Faculty members are recruited from all strata of society, to foster inclusivity, gender balance and socio-economic equity, to develop fruitful partnerships with both national and international institutions in academia and research,” the institute said while talking about the review.

The institute is also putting special efforts to recruit postdoctoral fellows from reserved categories so as to train them for faculty positions in academic institutions throughout the country, the review committee noted.

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IIT Bombay review committee's key recommendations

• The institute needs to modify the placement process to reduce stress amongst both UG and PG students.
• Flagging shortage of infrastructure, the committee suggested the institute plan for larger labs, more reading rooms, departmental libraries.
• Rapid expansion has resulted in infrastructural limitations, delay in decision-making, stress management issues, group-specific difficulties and there is a need for re-organisation and consolidation of academic units.
• IIT Bombay should aim to rank among the top 20 global institutions and within top 10 in specific domains.
• The institute should prioritize research in artificial intelligence, machine learning, biotechnology.
• The institute should promote a vigorous post-doctoral programme to enhance research output and must plan to arrange accommodation for researchers.
• There is a need to improve the faculty-to-student ratio.
• Restructuring of academic units and programmes is another requirement.
• Some labs including the core engineering ones are outdated and require modification.
• The institute’s attention should be on the need for academic oversight, enhancement of teaching quality, mentoring students and researchers for careers in academia or R&D, standardization of grading practices, systematic collection of feedback, and a potential revision of academic policies.
• The institute can consider setting up supplementary campuses nearby or in the state.
• IITB should consider establishing outreach campuses and creating online or hybrid multi-institution programmes.
• The committee necessitates the establishment of a dedicated human resource welfare division comprising qualified professionals.