The National Institutes of Technology (NITs) (Hindi: राष्ट्रीय प्रौद्योगिकी संस्थान), are a group of higher education engineering institutes in India. Comprising thirty autonomous institutes, they are located in one each major state/territory of India. On their inception decades ago, all NITs were referred as Regional Engineering Colleges (RECs) and were governed by their respective state governments. A parliamentary legislation in 2002[1] brought them under the direct purview of India's federal government. In 2007, through another legislation, the Indian government declared these schools as Institutes of National Importance at par with the Indian Institutes of Technology.
NITs were founded to promote regional diversity and multi-cultural understanding in India. Therefore, in the NIT school system, half of the student population in each batch is drawn from the respective state of the NIT and the other half is drawn from the rest of India on a common merit list. This is different than the Indian Institutes of Technology or IITs - another prominent engineering school system in India. An IIT need not accept specified number of students from any region of India as the IIT admission criteria is based only on the performance of a student in an entrance examination.
NITs offer degree courses at bachelors, masters, and doctorate levels in various branches of engineering and technology. Various nationwide college surveys rate most of the NITs over other colleges in India,[2] except for the IITs and a few other institutions. NITs function autonomously, similarly to IITs, sharing only entrance tests. The autonomy enables the NITs to set up their own curriculum, thereby making it easier to adapt to changing industry requirements.
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Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, then the home minster of India sought to develop India as a leader in science and technology. The Government started fourteen RECs between 1959 and 1965, at Bhopal, Allahabad, Calicut, Durgapur, Kurukshetra, Jamshedpur, Jaipur, Nagpur, Rourkela, Srinagar, Surathkal, Surat, Tiruchirappalli, and Warangal). It established one in Silchar in 1967 and added two others located at Hamirpur in 1986, and Jalandhar in 1987.
The RECs were jointly operated by the central government and the concerned state government. Non-recurring expenditures and expenditures for post-graduate courses during the REC period were borne by the central government, while recurring expenditure on undergraduate courses was shared equally by central and state governments.
The success of technology-based industry led to high demand for technical and scientific education. Due to the enormous costs and infrastructure involved in creating globally respected Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT), in 2002 MHRD Minister Murli Manohar Joshi decided to upgrade RECs to "National Institutes of Technology" (NITs) instead of creating IITs. The central government controls NITs and provides all funding. In 2003, all RECs became NITs.
The upgrade was designed along the lines of the prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) after it was concluded that RECs had potential as proven by the success of their alumni and their contributions in the field of technical education. Subsequently, funding and autonomy for NITs increased, and they award degrees which have raised their graduates' perceived value. These changes implemented recommendations of the "High Powered Review Committee" (HPRC).[3] The HPRC, chaired by Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, submitted its report entitled "Strategic Road Map for Academic Excellence of Future RECs" in 1998.
In 2006, MHRD issued NIT status to three more colleges, located at Patna (Bihar Engineering College - a 110 year old college), Raipur (Government Engineering College),[4] and Agartala (Tripura Engineering College).[4] Based on the request of state governments and feasibility, future NITs are either converted from existing institutes or can be freshly created. The 21st (and the first brand-new) NIT is planned for Imphal in the north-eastern state of Manipur at an initial cost of Rs. 500 crores. In 2010, the government announced setting up ten new NITs[5] in the remaining states/territories. This would lead to every state in India having its own NIT.
With the Indian technology industry's continuing growth, the government decided to upgrade twenty National Institutes of Technology to full-fledged technical universities. Parliament passed enabling legislation, the National Institutes of Technology Act in 2007 and took effect on 15 August of that year. The target is to fulfill the need for quality manpower in the field of engineering, science, and technology and to provide consistent governance, fee structure, and rules across the NITs.[6][7][8] in both houses of Parliament. The law designates each NIT an Institute of National Importance (INI).
Average NIT funding increased to Rs. 50 crores by year 2008. On average, each NIT also receives Rs. 20-25 crores under World Bank funded Technical Education Quality Improvement Program (TEQIP).[9] All NITs have shown improvements in student quality, administration structure, academic research, and student placements.[10][11][12]
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The President of India is the "ex officio visitor" and the most powerful person in the NIT organizational structure. The NIT Council works directly under him and includes the minister-in-charge of technical education in Central Government, the Chairmen and the Directors of all the NITs, the Chairman of University Grants Commission (India), the Director General of CSIR, the Directors of other selected central institutions of repute, members of Parliament, Joint Council Secretary of Ministry of Human Resource and Development, nominees of the Central Government, AICTE, and the Visitor.
Below the NIT Council is each NITs Board of Governors. The Director serves under the Board of Governors, and is the school's chief academic and executive officer. Academic policies are decided by its Senate, which is composed of all professors and other representatives. The Senate controls and approves the curriculum, courses, examinations, and results. Senate committees examine specific academic matters. The teaching, training, and research activities of various departments of the institute are periodically reviewed to maintain educational standards. The Director is the ex officio Chairman of the Senate. The Deputy Director is subordinate to the Deputy Director. Together they manage the Deans, Heads of Departments, Registrar, President of the Students' Council, and Chairman of the Hall Management Committee. Deans and Heads of Departments in NITs are administrative postings rather than career paths. Faculty members serve as Deans and Heads of Departments for limited periods, typically 2–3 years, then returning to regular faculty duties. The Registrar is the chief administrative officer and overviews day-to-day operations. Below the Head of Department (HOD), are the various faculty members (professors, assistant professors, and lecturers). The Warden serves under the Chairman of the Hall Management Committee.
The BOG of every individual NIT consists of the following members:
be nominated by the Govt. of India.
nominated by Central Govt.
Governors
Admission to NIT Bachelors degree programs follows a merit list published after the result of the All India Engineering Entrance Examination. Applicants are also required to have at a minimum, a pass grade in the class 12 exam or equivalent.
Each NIT takes 50 percent of students from its home state and 50 percent from the rest of India. They implement an affirmative action policy called reservation for the "Other Backward Classes" at 27%, "Scheduled castes" at 15% and Scheduled tribes at 7.5%.
A fixed number of seats is reserved for NRI students and foreign nationals.
Admissions policy is changing so that admissions of the non-local half of the student body would be made on the basis of the All India Rank, irrespective of any state seats, A possible future revision would admit all students on a national basis, irrespective of state quotas.[13][14]
The AIEEE exam was taken by about one and a half million students in April, 2010 making it one of the largest entrance examinations in the world.[15]
Courses are divided into semesters with evaluation on the basis of credits, which allows for proportional weighting based on the course's importance. For each semester, grades range from 0 to 10. Semester evaluations are independently. The weighted average of the semesters is used to compute the cumulative grade point average (CGPA).
Some NITs offer 'Research Scholar' programs to encourage research-oriented thinking in young minds. IIT Kanpur offers a 10-week summer undergraduate research scholar program for its students as well as for sophomore and later NIT students. The program has improved NIT staff quality.
NITs are implementing dual degree programs, integrated postgraduate studies that complete in 5 years rather than the 6 year conventional track of a Bachelor's followed by a Master's degree. These programs encourage academic research, and began with mathematics and computing.
Stringent faculty recruitment and industry collaboration also contribute to NIT success. Faculty other than lecturers must have a Ph.D. and relevant teaching and industry experience. Existing faculty who do not meet these criteria enroll under a Quality Improvement Programme (QIP) at IITs and IISc.
NITs are known for its placements. Placements in NITs have grown significantly and is close to 100% in most of the NITs. Industry prefers NIT students because of the cultural diversity that each NIT enjoys with people coming from all over India. A good number of PSUs recruit students from each NIT.
NITs provide on-campus housing to students, research scholars, and faculty members.[16] Students live in hostels, also known as halls, throughout their college life. Most have single accommodation but many live in double or triple rooms during their initial years. Every hostel has a recreation room equipped with cable television, magazines, newspapers, and indoor games and in-room Internet connectivity. Every hall has its own cafeteria managed by the college or by a local private organization.[17] NITs also have a common cafeteria for students and a separate cafeteria for professors. During vacations, hostel dining is generally closed and the common cafeterias serve students who stay on campus.
All the NITs have an athletic ground and facilities for field, indoor and aquatic events.[18]
NIT campuses across India arrange official welcome parties and interaction sessions to acquaint newcomers with senior students and professors. Faculties and researchers from IITs and IISc organize occasional technical seminars and other reputed foreign universities and research labs.
NITs have a Central Library equipped with technical books, literature, fiction, scientific journals, and other electronic material. Most have digitized their libraries. Some provide an intranet library facility. Every departmental library has high-speed connectivity. Electronic libraries allow students access to online journals and other periodicals through the AICTE-INDEST consortium, an initiative by the Ministry of Human Resource Development. Students also have access to IEEE documents and journals.[19][20] While some have video conferencing facilities, others are upgrading under the World Bank funded TEQIP scheme.
Some NITs individually conduct elections to elect student body a General Secretary and Vice President. These representatives are generally responsible for communicating with the college management and media, organising festivals, and also for various development programmes in their college. Some NITs (such as SVNIT, Surat and VNIT, Nagpur) have recently adopted online voting process. The committee which monitors the flow of funds has a student body representative. This committee also includes the Chairman of Board, an MHRD Representative, and NIT professors. But due to some disturbance in voting process, there have been no elections since 2008 in SVNIT, Surat.[21]
The Disciplinary Committee (DISCO) consists of the Director, the student affairs officer, and professors. and reports to MHRD. DISCO regulates student activities and combats student harassment and illegitimate student politics. After a series of harassment incidents, all NITs took strict measures especially to protect first year students.[22]
Popular extra curricular activities include National Cadet Corps (NCC), National Service Scheme (NSS), Indian Society for Technical Education (ISTE), and annual college festivities.[23][24]
Students at NITs run hobby clubs such as Linux User Groups (LUGs), music clubs, debate clubs, literary clubs, and web design teams. Students also publish campus magazines which showcase student creativity and journalism. Students conduct regular quizzes and cultural programs. They also present research papers and participate in national level technical festivals at NITs, IITs, and IISc. Most NITs promote entrepreneurship by creating on-campus incubation centers under the STEP program.[25][26][27]
Students also participate in the activities of Training and Placement Department (TPD) by directly helping the Training and Placement (TnP) officers to boost their college's placement record. In all the NITs, the TPD invites companies for recruitment and arranges amenities for company representatives.
Organization for Inter-NIT Student Activities (O-INSA) coordinates cultural, technical, sports and other groups.[28]
NITs compete annually in an Inter-NIT sports meeting, which rotates among schools.[28][29] Winners get cash prizes and trophies. Boys and girls compete separately. During February and March, NITs conduct annual sports contests in their respective locations. However, since 2007-2008, Inter NIT meetings have not been held during the academic calendar, to facilitate participation of more NITs and to avoid students missing class. In recent years, NIT Durgapur has been the most successful.[30]
NITs conduct technical and cultural festivals to showcase student talents.[31] Technical festivals include research paper presentations, business quizzes and robotics competitions. Some NITs conduct online coding contests, attracting participants from multinational corporations and international universities. NITs also conduct cultural festivals with celebrity and student participants, including those from other schools. Festivals last 3 to 4 days and are usually held in the spring. Corporations and college management help fund these events.
NIT Warangal hosts the second biggest technical festival "Technozion" and cultural festival "Spring spree".
NITK Surathkal hosts the second biggest cultural extravaganza in South India called Incident and also organizes a technical fest, Engineer which claims a participation of around a hundred colleges and is acclaimed as South India's biggest Technical Fest after Shastra of IIT Madras.
NIT Trichy organizes a technical fest called "Pragyan" and one of the biggest cultural festivals in Tamil Nadu called "Festember".[32][33][34]
NIT Rourkela organizes the largest techno-management festival in the state of Orissa, named "InnoVision" (formerly "Confluence") and also the spring festival, "Nitrutsav" annually in the month of November and March, respectively.
NIT Agartala conducted two fests, a techfest known as "Aayam" and a cultural fest known as "Mokshaa".
MNIT Jaipur holds "Blitzschlag MNIT Jaipur", the annual cultural festival, in January. It is known to be the biggest festival in the state of Rajasthan and one of the biggest of all NITs.
VNIT Nagpur conducts "AXIS", the biggest science festival. It also conducts "AAROHI", the largest cultural festival in Central India, started in year 1988. Love4Physics club of VNIT Nagpur organises the only science cum engineering Olympiad in India, "YUDHYA".
NIT Jalandhar annually conducts a national level cultural festival called "UTKANSH" and a technical fest called "TECHNITI".
MNNIT Allahabad hosts the largest knowledge festival, "Gnosiomania". MNNIT's technical festival is called "Avishkar". Its cultural festival is called "Culrav" and is held in February.
NIT Hamirpur annually conducts a national level cultural festival called "Hill 'Ffair" in fall and an engineering festival called "Nimbus" in spring.
NIT Patna's technical and cultural festivals are CORONA and Melange respectively.
NIT Jamshedpur's technical festival generally occurs in March, and is called Ojass, immediately followed by Utkarsh, the cultural festival. Also, the Metallurgy and Materials Science department of the college holds its own festival Technica.
SVNIT, Surat organises "Autumn Fest" combining "Entru-Meet" an entrepreneurial festival, "Autofest", an automobile festival, conducted by SAE and "Quest" and an ACM initiative in the odd semester. In the even semester, it conducts a technical festival named "Mindbend" and a cultural festival called "Sparsh".
NIT Durgapur organises ten festivals each year, the most among NITs. They include Ank, Cinefest, Verve, Robocity, Mukti, Motor Zundung, Aarohan, Recstacy, Conoscenza and Elixier.
NIT Silchar organises Incandescence-The techno-cultural fest. Under its umbrella comes Sankriti the cultural fest and Technoesis the technical. NIT Silchar also organises Bizarcade the biz fest for the budding entrepreneurs of India and Thundermarch, the rock fest.
NIT Calicut conducts two main festivals, Tathva, its technical festival and Ragam, its Cultural festival.
NIT alumni work in many countries. Many cities host NIT alumni associations. A common PAN-NIT alumni network network is under consideration. This would include the alumni associations of individual institutes and would enable a more complete database.
In most NITs, alumni sponsor scholarship programs for low-income students. NIT alumni either take up key positions in global corporations or work in academia joining institutions of repute in India such as IITs, IISc, IIMs, NITs or abroad such as Stanford, Caltech etc. Further, every year, lot of NIT alumni choose to pursue an education in business management at prestigious institutes such as Indian Institutes of Management, Indian School of Business, Xavier Labour Relations Institute etc. in India and the likes of Stanford University, Wharton Business School, Georgia Institute of Technology, Carnegie Mellon and Massachusetts Institute of Technology abroad.
A final draft of a document proposing a "Vision-2025 for NITs"[35] has been circulated to the directors of all the twenty NITs and will be submitted to the Government of India upon their final approval. The Draft Committee Chairman said that the Vision-2025 Document primarily embodied the plan of action, areas of thrust for emerging technologies, and scope of NITs in nation-building.
The draft visualizes greater autonomy for NITs and identifies 16 emerging fields such as food processing, agriculture, healthcare, nanotechnology, and biotechnology as potential focus areas.
The draft proposes a generalized structure for the NIT Council and governance and that the council include senior MHRD officials, eminent educationists, NIT directors and invited renowned scientists and researchers.
The document proposes producing thinking engineers after accepting that despite creating world-class infrastructure, the present system has failed to produce engineers capable of developing new technologies. The draft defines thinking engineers as technically sound, sensitive to national issues and also possessed of the necessary zeal. The draft has a detailed description about the various programs and activities of the institutions during the coming two decades. It also summarizes the activities and projects in the fields of resource management, disaster mitigation, entertainment and lifestyle, computer and IT services, material and processing, as well as technology management.
The need for an intranet among the NITs was very strongly expressed during the meeting of the directors held at MANIT Bhopal. Hence an intranet (possibly named as NITNET) was conceived. The intranet was expected to nurture research, collaboration and overall academic development. In developed countries, especially the U.S., major colleges and universities share a very high-speed intranet, called Internet2. Incidentally, the government-owned ERNET network is a member of Internet2.[36] NITs may join this network.
Initially, the NITNET may be implemented as a VPN (Virtual Private Network) through a well-established ISP. For this purpose, the Ministry of Human Resources Department (MHRD) would have to sanction an initial grant of Rs 10 crores, with a recurring charge of Rs 5 lakhs per institute.
Motilal Nehru NIT, Allahabad is constructing a building to commemorate the golden jubilee of the REC/NIT scheme. The building would have a data center and potentially a nodal intranet center. After fine-tuning the specifications, a proposal would be made to all the directors and upon consensus, funds would be requested from MHRD.
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