IIT Kharagpur mulls offline classes as Covid situation improves

KOLKATA: With the improvement in the overall COVID-19 situation, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur authorities are planning to start offline classes but the dates for that will be decided only after all the students are back on the campus, registrar Tamal Nath said on Friday.

Around 7,000 students, approximately half of their total number, are already in the hostels and the labs are open. “Offline classes can begin again only after all the students are present. We have approximately around 15,000 students and their parents have been informed,” he said.

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No timeframe to start offline classes has been decided yet and it will depend on the arrival of all students. Right now, the institute is conducting online classes that had been continuing since mid-March of 2020 after the suspension of classroom teaching due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the registrar said.

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IIT Kharagpur had previously planned to start on-campus activities from January after the convocation was held on the hybrid mode in December 2021 but due to the sudden spike in cases, that plan was shelved. The situation has improved substantially now.