National Hero and International Zero

Recently, India Today ranked us as the best engineering college of the country. Here is the link to the news story.

In the last paragraph, India Today has quoted Prof. Sanjay Dhande, Director. He apparently said:

"Indian society looks at IITs as elite undergraduate institutions. This is unfortunate. IITs should have created an impact in research, postgraduate education, development of technologies for the benefit of society and providing effective academic and intellectual leadership to the society at large. This has not been the case. Society should demand more from IITs instead of merely glorifying them as elite undergraduate colleges. Being national heroes and international zeros is not going to work for long." (emphasis is mine)

I am sure that there is some miscommunication and Prof. Dhande has been quoted out of context. We are not comparable to the best in the world, but calling us "Zeros" is not a fair evaluation either.

IIT Kanpur is Ranked Number 1 by India Today

India Today has ranked IIT Kanpur as the top engineering institute in the country. The rankings have been delayed this year and have been published in the July 18 issue of India Today. Here is the link to the online article.

IIT Kanpur was also ranked number 1 last year by India Today. Six of the seven old IITs are in top 10, along with IT BHU. (IIT Bombay is not in the list, perhaps they did not participate.) Outside the IIT system, the three institutes in the top 10 are: BITS Pilani, DTU (earlier known as DCE), and NIT at Surathkal.