IIT Kanpur

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur

File:IITKLogo.jpg
Motto	तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय (tamaso mā jyotirgamaya) Lead me from darkness to light
Type	Education and Research Institution
Established	1959
Undergraduates	2,000 (approx)
Postgraduates	2,000 (approx)
Location	Kanpur , Uttar Pradesh , India
Campus	4.3 km²
Website	http://www.iitk.ac.in

The Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (IITK) is one of the Indian Institutes of Technology, set up in the then-industrial city of Kanpur in 1960. IIT Kanpur has grown into one of the top technological institutes in India, primarily focused on research in engineering and science, and the teaching of undergraduates.

History

IIT Kanpur was established by an Act of Parliament in 1959. The institute was started in December 1959 in a room in the Canteen Building of the Harcourt Butler Technological Institute at Agricultural Gardens in Kanpur. In 1963, the Institute moved to its present location, on the historic Grand Trunk Road near the village of Kanpur in Kanpur district. During the first ten years of its existence, IIT Kanpur benefited from the Kanpur Indo-American Programme, where a consortium of 9 US universities namely M.I.T, University of California, Berkeley, California Institute of Technology, Princeton University, Carnegie Institute of Technology, University of Michigan, Ohio State University, Case Institute Of Technology and Purdue University helped set up the research laboratories and academic programmes. The first Director of the Institute was Dr. P. K. Kelkar (after whom the Central Library was renamed in 2002).

Under the guidance of eminent economist John Kenneth Galbraith, IIT Kanpur was the first institute in India to start Computer Science education. The earliest computer courses were started at IIT Kanpur in August 1963 on an IBM 1620 system, a novelty then even in many North American and European universities. Gradually, the Institute drew upon some of the brightest young Indians in Computer Science to serve on its faculty and in 1971, initiated an independent academic program, leading to M.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees.

Board of Governors

Board of Governors includes:

• Prof. M Anandakrishnan (Chairman)
• Prof. Sanjay Govind Dhande (Director)
• Dr. G.K. Mehta (Eminent Nuclear scientist)
• Anil Ambani (CEO ADAE)
• Dr. S.S. Lele (Director IT BHU)
• Aman Kumar Singh (CEO, CHIPS)

Laboratories and other facilities

Tutorial Block of IIT Kanpur

The sprawling campus is spread over an area of 4.3 km². The Institute has a number of facilities, including the National Wind Tunnel Facility. Other large research centres include the Advanced Centre for Material Science, a Bio-technology centre, the Advanced Centre for Electronic Systems, and the Samtel Centre for Display Technology, Centre for Mechatronics, Centre for Laser Technology, Prabhu Goel Research Centre for Computer and Internet Security, Facility for Ecological and Analytical Testing. The institute is also going to get a state of the art nanotechnology research centre soon. The P K Kelkar library has an exhaustive collections of academic textbooks, peer-reviewed journals, and other research material in the country, and boasts of an excellent reference section (where course material is reserved for students). In addition, the various departments have their own smaller libraries. Apart from this, IIT Kanpur also has its own airfield, for flight testing and gliding activities.

The Western Labs

The Computer-Centre (referred to by the campus residents as "C-C") has about 100-150 Linux terminals and more than 100 Windows-NT terminals supported by PARAM 10000 super computer, and is continuously available to the students for academic work and recreation. Disk storage is provided using a networked file server system. Internet access is provided by the means of two proxy servers, one for students and another for faculty (the computer science department in IIT Kanpur has its own independent network). In addition, it hosts about 50 SUN workstations that are considered powerful workhorses for heavy computational tasks. It is a major intellectual, social and cultural hub in the campus. The IITs (and especially IIT Kanpur) and BITS Pilani are among the first large academic institutions in India to be extensively networked, with an institute-wide LAN and Ethernet access to every student room in the residence halls.

Students

PK Kelkar Library, IIT Kanpur, designed by Achyut Kanvinde

The undergraduate students at IIT Kanpur are selected through the Joint Entrance Examination of the IITs. The Post Graduate students are selected throuh various entrance exams. Master in Business Administration (MBA) - Joint Management Entrance Examination (JMET); Master of Science (M. Sc.) - Joint Admission Test (JAM); Master of Technology (M. Tech.) - Graduate Aptitute Test of Engineering (GATE). Presently, the institute has around 4,000 students, with an equal distribution of graduate and undergraduate students.

Students at IIT Kanpur reside in the hostels, or 'halls of residence', most of which have their own unique history and lore. There are eight hostels (Hall 1-5, 7-9) for boys and two for girls, called GH-1 (Girls Hostel 1) and GH-2 (formerly Hall 6).There is a bristling inter-hall rivalry between halls 2 , 3 and 5,as these are the halls the students are first allocated.

The annual cultural festival is called Antaragni. The annual science and technology festival, Techkriti, is held at the end of February each year. The annual sports festival, Udghosh/IIT Kanpur Sportsmeet, is held around the end of September each year and Umang, the annual Film Festival, is held in early January. All four are amongst the most popular college events in North India.The annual business festival Megabucks is also one of the landmark events in the iitk calendar.

In addition to this,each hall has its own cultural festival.

Avant Garde, a monthly eNewsletter is a collection and discussion of various issues that have an impact on the country as a whole.The Students also bring out a monthly campus newspaper - Vox Populi ,and a magazine Meander.

Another highlight of the student community is the self governance achieved in the form of the Students' Gymkhana, which is a democratically elected body.

The Students Gymkhana, is the centre of all inter hostel and intercollege activities that the students of IITK engage in. The Student Gymkhana has the following councils :

The Presidential Council, The Games Council, The Cultural Council, The Science and Technology Council, The Films and Media Council.

The President, heads the student body, followed by general secretaries for the subdivisions. A number of secretaries head the various smaller departments.The Student's Senate is a decision making body which comes under the Presidential Council.It has elected members who hold six-month terms in office.Typically,one student per every hundred is elected into the senate.

The English Literary Society[ELS] is one of the most active clubs in IIT Kanpur.It holds regular Dumb Charade,Extempore,Word games,Literary Discussions,Group Discussions,etc.The new batches are showing amazing potential.

The Book Club of IIT Kanpur has a very good compilation of books,and to date,has 5000 books.It has all popular authors and also not-so-famous critically acclaimed pieces.With a huge comic collection and a number of biographies,non-fiction,science fiction,fantasy etc cater to a wide audience.

SIDBI Innovation & Incubation Centre

IIT Kanpur has set up the SIDBI Innovation and Incubation Centre in collaboration with Small Industries development Bank of India (SIDBI) to foster innovation, research, and entrepreneurial activities in technology-based areas. SIIC provides a platform to Start-ups prospective entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs to convert their innovative ideas into commercially viable products. Incubatee Companies:

• Weather Risk Management Services Pvt. Ltd.
• Hexolabs Media and Technology Pvt. Ltd.
• Aurora Integrated Systems Pvt. Ltd.
• Simmortal Systems Pvt. Ltd.
• Innovative Embedded Systems
• Whorl Engineering Solutions Private Limited
• Multifacet Software Systems Pvt. Ltd.
• Empowered Interactive Pvt. Ltd.

Alumni

• Ashoke Sen (String theorist)
• N.R. Narayana Murthy (founded the software corporation Infosys)
• Manindra Agrawal, Nitin Saxena, and Neeraj Kayal (proved with their AKS primality test that the problem of checking primality has a polynomial time algorithm, a major result in theoretical computer science)
• Pradeep Sindhu (Founder - Juniper Networks)
• Ashok Jhunjhunwala (Padma Shri and Professor, Dept of Electrical Engineering, IIT Madras)
• Satyendra Dubey (Whistle-blower whose murder shocked the nation)

IIT Kanpur alumni have also made significant contribution in performing arts, journalism, music and allied fields.

Important note: More details of the above persons, including their year of graduation, can be found in this article: List of notable Indian Institutes of Technology alumni.

Awards and Recognitions

• C.N.R. Rao (Chairman, IIT Kanpur) received the Dan David Prize, given by the Dan David Foundation, Tel Aviv University.
• C.N.R. Rao was conferred the title Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour) by France, the highest civilian award given by the French Government.
• Godel Prize to Rajeev Motwani (2001) and Manindra Agrawal, Neeraj Kayal and Nitin Saxena (2006).

Products and Developments

• Brihaspati Virtual Classroom

External links

• Official Website
• Alumni Website
• 1970s America - An Indian student's journey Memoirs of IIT Kanpur student in US in 1970s.