048 - IIT Madras in the 60's Vs IIT Madras Today in 2020

On the 9th of Nov 2019, Fathima Lateef a Humanities student of IIT Madras ended her life and she blamed two staff members for harassing her.

I maintain a Blog on "Suicides in IITs" hoping to raise awareness with IIT Administrators and HRD Ministry that they cannot keep sweeping these deaths under the carpet, have take full responsibility and proactively address the issue of suicides on campus as is done in Universities abroad.

IMHO Any student making it into an IIT is in the top 1% of students in India with very high IQ and it is disturbing to see them drop like flies and it just keeps happening again and again and again. My Blog Lists 124 Suicides in IITs alone, of which 121 suicides were in this millenium and that is a Whooping average of six suicides every year.

Many Journalists have contacted me over the years on the same topic, but there is a spate of requests for interviews and phone calls seeking my opinion on the matter after Fathimas suicide. I have declined to comment as this has become very political and has now become a police investigation.

Right now in 2019, India has the highest Youth population and India is also said to be the Suicide Capital of the world.

Student suicides in India - One suicide every hour (Wiki)

According to 2015 data from the National Crime Records Bureau, 8934 (6.7% of all suicides) students are committing suicide every year. That's one student every hour. Inspite of being the advanced states of India, Maharashtra holds the first place with 1230 of 8934 suicides (14%) and Tamil Nadu holds the second place with 955 of 8934 suicides (10%).

I graduated from IIT Madras in 1970 and during my stay I do not remember of any suicides amongst the undergraduates. One M.Tech Student I knew personally took his life as the girl he was madly in love with, outside the campus rejected him. Not related to academic pressure.

There have been 5 Suicides at IITM in 2019 alone and there is an urgent need to compare IITM Today in 2019 VS what it was in the 60's and 70's.

Let me list ten best things I loved about IIT Madras during my stay

IITs: A bit if History ( From IIT Delhi Website)

The concept of the IITs was first introduced in a report in the year 1945 by Sh. N.M.Sircar, then member of Education on Vicerory’s Executive Council. Following his recommendations, the first Indian Institute of Technology was established in the year 1950 in Kharagpur. In his report, Shri Sircar had suggested that such Institutes should also be started in different parts of the country. The Government having accepted these recommendations of the Sircar Committee decided to establish more Institutes of Technology with the assistance of friendly countries who were prepared to help. 

The first offer of help came from USSR who agreed to collaborate in the establishment of an Institute through UNESCO at Bombay. This was followed by the Institutes of Technology at Madras, Kanpur and Delhi with collaborations with West Germany, USA and UK respectively. Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati was established in 1995 and the University of Roorkee was converted into an IIT in 2001.

Best Aspects of my IITM experience:

1. Freedom: Compulsory Hostel Living meant staying away from home giving us total freedom to manage or mismanage our lives. Local Madras students had a problem as every Saturday or Sunday they went home and that was the time the rest of the students were having fun or finishing off assignments. This for me a Madras resident meant burning the midnight candle every night of the week. 
2. Campus: The Campus was awesome, perhaps the best in the country. Some 600 acres of greenery with academic buildings set way inside the campus and hostels set further back and away from the lecture theatres, Labs and workshops. Which Uni Campus can boast of Deer roaming freely ? IITM was like a sanctuary
3. Hostels: All Hostels were newly built and were in pristine condition. Loved the design with a quadrangle in the middle, student accommodation on the two longer sides and a common room at one end and a dining hall which was called a mess at the opposite end. (Do not ask me why it was called a mess? Pun Intended) Hostels had three floors on each side with a central staircase and each wing had 16 rooms and a total of 192 rooms, single accommodation
4. Sharing Hostels with Seniors: In the 1st year all of us were in one hostel and this helped us bond with many and get to know most if not all. In years 2.3.4 and 5 Each hostel had a mix of seniors and juniors and that to me was an amazing aspect. When we had some doubts or did not understand a topic in any subject we could always ask the seniors. One such mentor for me was Gurusharan Singh Siddhu. The day the final exams were over my friend came with his car so I could pack up and go home. The car wouldnt start and the driver was at a loss to start the old Austin A40. Our Good Luck Sidhu comes to the hostel on his push bike. He just comes, open the bonnet adjusts the carburetor and the car starts. He was a natural born engineer and little did I know that he would win the Presidents Gold Medal on completion of his B.Tech course and top the class at Stanford. Sidhu was Steve Jobs right hand man at Apple from 1982 to 1996 and an Apple Fellow. He is now a Senior Director at Microsoft from 2005.
5. National Integration: IIT's to us was all about National Integration. Classmates and buddies were from all over India and even Nepal. Born a Kalapani in Andaman Islands I got on famously with Hindi speaking North Indians. Born a Hindu, Studied in a Catholic School and had a ton of Muslim friends so I had no religious barriers what so ever.
6. Hostel Mess: Most spoilt brats complained about the quality and type of food served at the mess. Each one wanted what they were used to at home. One year I was elected mess secretary and tried my best to please all factions and I can say most were content with the menu that I came up with. I still long for the Masala Dosas that were served on week ends.
7. Sporting & Entertainment Facilities: at IITM we had our own Stadium, our own swimming pool, our own Cricket Ground, and tennis, basket ball and volley ball courts plus every hostel quadrangle was a space to play sports. Each Hostel had a Common Room and all of them had a Table tennis table, a few carrom boards, a great stereo Sound system and a huge collection of LPs like the Shadows, Elvis and the Beatles. Then we had the Unique Open Air Theatre for all staged performances, musical events and movies every Saturday. Last but not least, IITM has its own skating rink. ( Not sure if this is still there)
8. West German Collaboration: IT Madras was established in collaboration with West Germany and this meant we had many expat German Professors teaching and heading departments. Germany provided IITM with state of the art equipment for all Laboratories and even more awesome was they had the best workshops with the best German machinery for training in Carpentry, smithy, electrical and machine shop with best lathes milling and shaping machines, electrical and electronics workshop. In the first year all students had one week of lectures and one week of workshops helping us become hands on Engineers. I loved the Workshop experience on Campus. One summer vacation in my fourth years I worked with Prof Rouve Head of Hydraulics Department helping him with his research on "Studies in Open Channel Flow" and Got Paid Rs 50 a week( I think). This to me was the most outstanding experience on Campus. Not only did he allow me to assist him he was very open minded about suggestions and always asked what do you think we should do when we were in a fix. For my final year project my team wanted to include a Computer program for stress analysis of Concrete dams sections under varying water levels. I approached Prof Rouve and he instructed his off sider Rhode to take our Fortran Program punched in Cards to Guindy Engineering college to run as IITM did not have a Computer then. Prof Rouve boasted to the external examiner from Guindy Engg College about our Dam analysis program.
9. Comraderie: 2020 will mark the 50th Anniversary of my Graduation from IITM and thanks to Social Media All batchmates are connected via Yahoo Groups and Whatsapp/Face book etc and we carry on as if nothing has changed except most of us are now Bald with pot bellies and waddling on but still naughty at heart like the teenagers we were on Campus 50 years ago.
10. Students like me had No Expectations: Last but not least the students who joined IITs, took a basic exam that tested their proficiency in English & Science . There were no Coaching schools. IITs were an unknown entity and my Dad thought it was a Polytechnic institute and told me I was not goign to Join any IIT, BIT, CIT but was going to Guidy Engineering college. Basically the ones who got in wanted to as they had the aptitude but we had no Expectations what so ever. There was no Hype about the IIT Brand then. In fact I was at the Cinemas and watched Cleopatra at Elephanston Theatre the night before IIT Entrance exam. I always wanted to be an Engineer and nothing else.

But here is feed back from buddies:

Peter Masilamani:

Ten best aspects: 

1. Excellent sports facilities.
2. Independence .
3. Great discussions on all subjects , in the hostels
4. Open spaces, especially hostel quadrangle configuration, large distance between academic areas and living areas.
5. Good friendships/ camaraderie built up.
6. Living with seniors in years 2, 3 and 4.
7. Availabilty of proxy attendance which allowed going to movies, coffee, Knick Knack.
8. OAT movies, entertainment.
9. Beat-X.
10. Common room ... newspapers , magazines, games like carroms, music  systems and music.
11. Excellent natural surroundings, wildlife , deer, black buck, partridge,etc. wonderful trees ( remember coconut trees growing out of banyan type trees.

10 worst aspects:

1. Lousy teachers
2. Demotivation by the poor quality of teachers.
3. Poor food in hostels
4. Periodicals
5. Not enough laboratory exposure.
6. Curriculum was not really weighted to specialization ( e.g. in Mech we had three streams : production, instrumentation and design. We only got exposure for 1 year in final year. I completed my project in  4 weeks ( allotted time was 10 months).It was so good that my guide Basu John got me an exchange program to go to Germany for 6 months, and also gave a job. I was probably the first guy to get a job. Imagine if I had spent 3 years doing stuff like that! Sad waste of talent.
7. Subjects gave a very broad exposure  maybe too broad. Interesting to Know that clay bricks should be immersed in water for 24 hours and then dropped from 4 feet onto a hard surface and not break. Not very relevant to any engineer other than civil.above is one example of poor course design.
8. Computers was not a part of the General course though there were some optional in FORTRAN  etc.
9. Conflict between periodical system and exam system. If continual study was important they should have given 100 % to periodicals. Hence you are only the ball right through or your balls get crushed. 
10. In all fairness, since our knowledge/ comfort level in English was an advantage, poor English would have kept out a lot of very smart people and also disadvantaged some during the 5 years. Maybe they should have offered “ catch up” classes as they do here at Geneva U for students who need to come up the curve in French, the language of instruction. 

 RANGA IITM 1969 Batch:

[3:47 PM, 11/25/2019] 😇💚 Ranga IITM 1969:

7 best aspects of iitm.

1. fun classmates
2. saturday night movie
3. saturday night curd rice
4. Campastimes
5. Appavoo --fitting instructor
6. MK Achuthan, electronics prof.
7. NCC camp at Ootty under Jaffry, good food


Bad aspects: some bad Profs., bad toilet at ncc camp

Chiku Machayya:

Best aspects:

1. Made the best friends in my life.
2. Expanded my horizons.
3. Learned very interesting stuff.
4. Had a room to myself.
5. Eating out at Hotel Runs.
6. Cycling into town once a month to see a movie and have dinner. 7. Learned to jog long distances.
8. Gained in self confidence.
9. Being in IIT helped me feel elitist.
10. Learned a hobby, ie, oil painting


 Ramanujam:

[1:56 AM, 11/25/2019] 😇😎 Ramanujam T. S:

Actually I like IIT a lot and so getting 10 best reasons was easy.

1. I liked the freedom the hostel life gave me. I still remember the first day when I realised how free I was with  no one to ask what you are doing or to tell you that you shouldnt be doing this and so on.I also never had had a room to myself.

2. The friends were so good and I was converted from a villager to an IIT ian only through them.

3. After some time the IIT name outside was so good and the respect everybody gave me (in fact even today) was simply too good.

4. The level of the knowledge of the friends was amazing especially a few who helped me in academics selflessly.

5 I enjoyed the Common room and the mess so much.

6. The whole campus with so much greenery, deer, etc. was so refreshing and enjoyable.

7. Surprisingly I liked the ragging in our days which helped to humiliate those for whom the success in the entrance exam went to their heads.

8. I also enjoyed the movies at OAT and the tents at Thiruvanmiyur and Velachery.

9. Joint studies with good friends was very helpful in clearing so many subjects.

10. I actually enjoyed the wonderful workshops for a whole week and with no stress of studies during that week.


[2:03 AM, 11/25/2019] 😇😎 Ramanujam T. S:

As regards the negative aspects,

1. The surprise periodicals and the first   test episode when I got a D and Koteswara Roao telling me that my name was a misnomer still haunts me once in a way.

2. The teaching barring a few teachers was bad and except for the help of some brainy guys quite a few of us would have given up.

3. As a result of this the whole academics was very strenuous and filled with stress.

4. The 2nd year was the worst and we were all afraid that we would not get through.

5. It was sad that we had to leave a few friends behind year after year.

Kuppuswamy:

Things I liked about IIT life

My desire to study in one of the top engineering institutions to become a good engineer met.

I enjoyed attending classes taught by teachers with a thorough knowledge of the subject.

I believed in working with my hands and be practical. Workshops gave me the opportunity.

I had good friends from whom I learnt a lot about the various engineering subjects.

I had freedom to be away from home . I learnt to be independent.

It was a pleasure to mix and mingle with students from different places across the country and neighboring countries too.

I had cultivated deep friendship with a selected few and cherish even today their friendship.

Being in a hostel away from city life , I could focus and study.

One of the attractions was lower maintenance expenses.

Had nice friends to make life pleasant.

Enjoyed sitting in the common room playing carroms and listening to music.

I love good food and I think got it. Looking forward to Sundays to eat masala dosas unlimited.

Enjoyed OAT environment.

Enjoyed seeing movies in the nearby Thiruvanmaiyur tent theater. Two movies in a row crossing the mid night.

I loved studying many allied subjects to electrical engineering. Found these useful in my career as engineer.

Happy IIT could make me a true engineer.

Uncomfortable things I faced at IIT

Having some faculty below par particularly in subjects which you like .

Too much periodicals pressure. Actually we use to trouble others and they were unhappy with us making us also unhappy.

the background at school and me being a pampered child ,I had difficulty in adjusting with the other students and the environment.

I had very few friends as I was more an introvert and feeling shy at that age to mix with people. It took time to adjust to become better.

Five years at IIT , I felt was too long.

I felt the interaction with many faculty members was not cordial . they were more business like which I was not comfortable with.

Kuppu 13 Dec2019


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Niranjan Bhat IITB 1975 Batch
I’ve listed a few things that I recall (and hence must feel strongly about). Pro or con -you
decide.

1. The friends/network. We’ve gone in many different directions, but good friends are still
good friends.

2. The opportunity to learn. Whether we did or not was our choice.

3. I cannot remember a single teacher (who taught me) with affection, except perhaps Amma
who taught us Logic. I do remember Jimmy Isaac with a great deal of affection.

4. The opportunity to do stuff other than study - make good friends, do plays, work with
BNS as SocSec, ferry girls from Sophia (in IIT for the drama festival) in Keshav’s car.

5. The opportunity to observe people from so many different backgrounds and how they
interacted with each other. Very helpful in life; made me a good “schmoozer”.

Warmly

Best:

* The gift of the reputation. Although I did not fully appreciate it at the time, what an honour
it is today to be an IIT Bombay graduate!

* For me personally, the leadership development opportunities were exceptional. It gave me
the ability and the confidence to Lead. Something that I have appreciated and worked on for most of my working life.

Worst:

* The winner in this regard was the lack of caring for students that the faculty (in general)
demonstrated. I expect that I am in the minority here, but that has never stopped me, but
while the credentials of the faculty were good, they were terrible teachers. Questions were
frowned upon. A culture of bullying and outright intimidation existed among some faculty.

Having been a top-rated faculty member now for well over four decades, I have modelled my
teaching to be the exact opposite of the negative role models I had at IIT Bombay.

I teach very tough courses, but almost each day I focus on how I can improve myself so that the
material I teach can be more interesting, more relevant, more enjoyable, and how I can help
my students -- at almost any time of the day or night. I honestly don't believe that our faculty
worried about such things. (There is much, much more I could write here.)

* The Ragging Culture and environment. I have fought that culture for more than half a
century. It is despicable and dangerous. (There is much, much more I could write here -- you
have already seen some of my views on WhatsApp.)

A feel good story: 

My department Chair for a while (forgive me -- I forget the name but I think it was Dr. Balasubramanian), was an exception. He cared and he helped students. When I thanked him for his help, he said, “It’s my job.” But, I could see that he appreciated my gesture. Later, he did something more to help me, and before I could
thank him again, he tragically and suddenly had a heart attack and passed away.

It bothered me tremendously that I never got to thank him for his kindness. Then, decades
later, one of my faculty colleagues brought a visitor from India to meet me. As it turned
out, that was the son of the former department Chair! He had been only a child when his
father had passed away. I told him of his father’s caring and kindnesses, and that his father had always stood out in my mind as being an exceptional individual who “did his job” very well; and I said Thank you though it was decades late.

I was thankful that I got to thank him on behalf of his father, even though it was decades after his action.