No permanent foreign faculty for IITs !!

In a major setback to the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) plan, the Ministry for External Affairs (MEA) has rejected a proposal to liberalise visa norms to allow foreign teachers to take up permanent posts at the IITs.

The MEA has refused to change the rules under which each foreign faculty member at the IITs needs to re-obtain a work visa every five years, top government and IIT sources have confirmed to HT.

Human resource development minister Kapil Sibal had on September 11, 2010 announced the plan to allow the IITs to fill up to 10% of their permanent teaching posts with foreign faculty.

The proposal -first reported by HT on September 2, 2010 -was approved by the IIT Council -the highest decision making body of the IITs -and is aimed at reducing a massive faculty crunch plaguing the IITs.

But the MEA's refusal to allow foreign faculty to join with visas of longer duration than five years means that the IITs will not be able to offer permanent posts to foreign faculty.

“We will need to continue to offer contractual appointments something we wanted to, and quite frankly, need to change,“ an IIT Director said.

Each IIT is facing a faculty crunch between 15 and 40% with a total of over 1,000 faculty posts vacant across the premier engineering schools. The Institutes have over the past year however received a number of applications from foreign faculty, including Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs) keen to teach at the IITs. The IITs are arguing that permanent posts would help them lure the best of foreign teachers.
Source: No permanent foreign faculty for IITs

Sibal rejects steep fee hike for IIT students !!

There will be no steep fee hike for the students of the Indian Institutes of Technology, according to a decision taken by the IIT Council on January 21.

Chairing the IIT Council meet here, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal rejected the Anil Kakodkar committee proposal for five-fold increase in fee for undergraduate programme of the IITs.

The Kakodkar committee, set up by the government in October 2009 to study the roadmap for the autonomy and future of the IITs, had recommended that the fee be raised from Rs 50,000 to Rs 2 to Rs 2.5 lakh per annum.

As the committee report came for discussion at the 42nd meeting of the IIT Council Sibal rejected the fee hike proposal saying “such a hike would prove a deterrent to a large number of IIT aspirants,” a ministry official said. The Council asked the committee to rework the fee structure taking into account the aspirations of all sections. During the meeting, Sibal announced setting up 50 research parks at a cost of Rs 200 crore during the 12th Five Year Plan period.

Under the programme, industry will undertake research on various subjects with the support of experts from the IITs.

The research parks have been proposed to be set up on public-private-partnership (PPP) model. One such research park has already come up in Chennai.

The meeting took note of the fact that credit-based practices were being followed by the IITs to promote students from one semester to the next, and agreed that academic bodies of the IITs should consider acquisition of credits as a criteria for students and granting of degrees to bring uniformity.

The issue came up following submission of Dhande committee report on uniform and homogeneous criteria for promoting students in the IITs.

Kanpur IIT director Dhande, who headed two committees, presented reports on a “uniform criteria for promoting students from one semester to the next in the IITs and on the “requirement of infrastructure for research”. Both reports have been accepted. Each IIT at present has its own criteria for promotion.

The Council decided that a panel for visitor’s nominee for a particular department would be created which all IITs could use for faculty selection. “This will ensure timely selection of professors,” the Council noted.

It also decided that the appointment of directors should be through advertisements so that a wider base was created.

“It was decided that in principle approval may be granted for setting up an institute in Mauritius with the help of the IITs,” an official said.

At the meeting, a presentation was made on adopting cyber security as part of the curriculum for the IITs. So it was decided that a committee be set up to develop a roadmap for the future and give a report in next three months.
Source Sibal rejects steep fee hike for IIT students

NITs demand pay parity with the IIT faculty !!

The National Institutes of Technology have demanded pay parity with the faculty of the Indian Institutes of Technology under a proposed salary regime that will enable them to compete for top teachers.

NIT directors rejected a differential pay structure between their institutes and the IITs proposed by a central pay panel at a meeting with Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal last week, officials said.

The meeting was slated as a courtesy call on Sibal, HRD ministry sources said. “But it transformed into a forum for the directors to demand that their faculty are not ready to accept lower pay than the IITs,” an official said.

The demand follows recommendations of the pay panel for Central technical institutes, headed by former Indian Institute of Science director Goverdhan Mehta. It suggested continuing with the different pay structures.

The IITs have traditionally enjoyed better pay for their faculty than the NITs and other top Central engineering institutions, including four Indian Institutes of Information Technology.

But the NITs, which also hold the tag of “Institutes of National Importance” like the IITs, argue that the government must no longer discriminate between different institutions it funds.

“Jawaharlal Nehru University may have a better reputation than some other central varsities, but the same pay scales hold for all Central universities. There is no reason why the system should be different in technical education,” an NIT director said.

The NITs also argue that lower pay scales prevent them from competing with the IITs for top teachers, propelling them into a “vicious cycle” where they can never hope to catch up with the IITs in quality.

The NITs had asked for equal pay during discussions with the Mehta committee on the salary review, according to the panel’s report.

Panel members point out that their report has recommended a hike in pay for faculty of all institutes, including the NITs. “It is natural for people to differ in their opinions on our report, but we believe we have given teachers across all institutions a wonderful deal,” Mehta said.

Another member argued that the different faculty structures at the IITs and the NITs make it “impossible” for their pay structures to be common.

The IITs have a four-tier faculty structure, with lecturers at the bottom of the rung followed by assistant professors, associate professors and professors.

source NITs demand pay parity with the IIT faculty

Happy New Year 2011

Happy New Year 2011

Seats in technical education to be increased

Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal Thursday announced revised norms for All India Council for Technical Education to increase the seats in technical education.

The ministry also made it mandatory for technical institutions to reserve 5 percent seats for the weaker sections of society.

'The aim is to increase the seats in technical institutions so that it can be more inclusive,' Sibal said after announcing the new norms.

The minister announced easing of norms for establishing new engineering colleges, expansion of institutions and number of seats, with a series of steps that would result in increase of seats in engineering institutions.

'Introduction of Section 25 of Company's Act to allow good corporates to set up Technical Institutions. However, no joint ventures can apply for this,' an official statement from the HRD ministry said.

Models like public-private partnership and build-operate-transfer will be used to involve the private sector in setting up technical institutes in 241 districts where there are no engineering colleges.

Easing the land norms for starting institutes, the HRD minister announced that lesser space will now be needed for establishing technical institutes. While an engineering college in rural India will need 10 acres of land, in urban areas it will require just 2.5 acres of land.

Special evening classes will also be conducted in the areas of Engineering, Technology, Architecture, Town Planning, Hospitality and Pharmacy by AICTE-approved institutes.

'This will facilitate the community around the Institutions to benefit by acquiring the skills provided by these Institutes. These Institutions are expected to form clusters with other institutions in the neighbourhood and collaborate with the Industries in the area in running these skill-based programmes,' the HRD minister said.
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Sources: Seats in technical education to be increased

Facebook offers Rs 38 lakh package for IIT Madras students !!

Social networking site Facebook has offered a package of Rs 38 lakh (USD 85,000) for IIT Madras students during the ongoing placement season, a top official of the institute said. Companies selecting prospective candidates from the country''s premier educational institute IIT Madras began on December 1.

However, Facebook leads the chart with a package of Rs 38 lakh, IIT Madras Advisor (Training and Placement) N Ramesh Babu said. "Every year, the selection process commences in December and this time too it began on December 1," he said.

Every year students eagerly await to participate in the campus selection and this year too more than 260 companies have registered so far, he said, adding, "But we expect it to cross 300 companies." Asked on the selection processes, he said the final round of interview would be done later.

"For example, Facebook after conducting all the rounds, will conduct another interview via Skype from the US and when a student gets selected he/she will be offered USD 85,000 package," Babu explained. He said around 1000 students from various streams including B Tech, MTech, MS, Doctoral programmes, MBA, have registered for placements this year and so far around 30 students have received offers from various multi-national companies including Goldman Sachs, IBM and Boston Consulting Group.

Last year the highest package was offered by Tower Research Capital at Rs 28 lakh per annum and about 225 companies had visited the institute for selecting 700 candidates.

IIM Common Admission Test to go global !!

The Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) are quietly working towards expanding their Common Admission Test into an international examination to draw students from abroad and to compete wIIM Ahemdabadith the globally-popular Graduate Management Aptitude Test.

According to an exclusive story published in Hindustan Times on July 2, credited to Charu Sudan Kasturi, the initiative is said to be a key component of a confidential contract signed between IIMs and Prometric, the American computer-based testing (CBT) service provider.

“Prometric will provide CBT services to IIMs in India ... and to IIMs for global expansion of the CAT program,“ states an agreement signed between the IIMs and the service provider, accessed through the Right to Information Act.

The “global expansion“ was also a reason why IIM rejected the bid of the Graduate Management Aptitude Council - a non profit body that conducts GMAT - for the computerisation of the CAT.

Read more: IIM Common Admission Test to go global