New measures being introduced in M.Tech programme of Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) will change the landscape of postgraduate education in India and align it with global trends quickly, according to Prof B.S. Murty, Director, IIT Hyderabad. Prof Murty was part of a three-member committee on reforms on M.Tech programme in IITs whose recommendations were accepted by the Union HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' during the IIT Council meeting held Friday here.
Members of the committee included Prof. B.S. Murty, Director, IIT Hyderabad, Prof. Manoj S. Gaur, Director, IIT Jammu and Prof. M. Balakrishnan, IIT Delhi.
Reasons behind the reforms included the percentage of M.Tech students placed in jobs during campus recruitment is small, a number of M.Tech seats are being unfilled due to the students leading M.Tech programmes to take up public sector and industry jobs, M.Tech is not the minimum requirement anymore for joining PhD and most of the IITs take B.Techs directly into PhD programme and earlier, people with M.Tech qualification were able to get into academic jobs, which no more the case and PhD is essential for a faculty position in most of the institutions, according to an official statement from IIT Hyderabad.
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The Committee made these four specific recommendations:
1. Increase the M.Tech. fee and bring it at least to the level of B.Tech. fee (Rs 2 lakh per year) over the next three years. Simultaneously the needy students should be supported directly by the Government through DBT (Direct Benefit Transfer) or arranging educational loans.
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2. The present stipend (Rs 12,400 p.m.) given as half-time teaching assistantship should be stopped and the good fraction of the M.Tech. fee (say 50%) be made available to the Departments for offering Teaching Assistantships (for UG labs and courses) to the students who are competent and want them. These funds can also be used for other professional activities of the Department.
3. Top one percentile of the students qualifying in each GATE discipline be offered full fellowship for 5 years (on par with regular PhD fellowship) to join any Institution of their choice for PhD (CSIR fellowship model in Sciences).
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4. Clear mechanism for encouraging Institutions to move towards sponsored students from Industry and/or organizations or even sponsored programs be put in place.
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