The Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur is a public research institute. NIRF ranked it 5th nationally in 2019. IIT Kanpur, established in 1960, is now among, one of the leading Engineering colleges in our country. The Indian Government declared it as an institute of national importance, under the Institutes of Technology Act.
The educational and research institution currently houses a total of 5,261 students, who enrolled for various undergraduate and postgraduate programs. IIT Kanpur offers an amazing faculty of more than 430 Ph.D. holding candidates, with an overall teacher-student ratio of 15.96. The institute was built under the assistance of nine US research universities, which are a part of the Kanpur Indo-American Programme (KIAP).
MOTTO: तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय (Sanskrit) [ From darkness, lead me to light]
TYPE: Public Technical University
ESTABLISHED: 1959
LOCATION: Kalyanpur, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India
CAMPUS: Urban
WEBSITE: www.iitk.ac.in
DIRECTOR: Abhay Karandikar
CHAIRMAN: K. Radhakrishnan
History of IIT Kanpur
The Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, established in 1960 was a KIAP initiative. It was supported by nine leading institutes of America. The institution was established under the Act of Parliament in 1959. The faculty members from the American institutes cooperated in setting up all the academic programs and the laboratories. IIT Kanpur started in December, within a room inside the canteen building, at the Agriculture Gardens in Kanpur. It started operating in the year 1959 with 100 students, in its first class.
IIT Kanpur was the first university in India, which offered computer science courses to its students, under the guidance of economist John Kenneth Galbraith. In August 1963, computer classes started on an IBM 1620 system. The initiative was taken under Prof. H.K. Kesavan’s chairmanship. Finally, in 1971, IIT Kanpur decided to offer independent academic courses in Computer Science and Engineering, which provided M.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees to the students.
In 1963, the institute shifted to its present location, which is in Kalyanpur, a district in Kanpur which is just a few kilometers away far from Central Kanpur. Its residential campus is spread over 420 hectares, comprising 2255 undergraduate and 1476 postgraduate students, 309 faculty members, and over 900 staff members. IIT Kanpur aims towards providing meaningful education and conducting high standard researches, to support innovation and industrial growth.
Academics
IIT Kanpur believes in empowering the students with a scientific approach, critical thinking, engineering, management, and humanities fields to find solutions to their problems that challenge mankind. The academic programs in at the intitute reward the students with exciting and globally acclaimed career opportunities.
The professors at IIT Kanpur engage the students in a communicative form of learning. The faculty is warm, welcoming and very much approachable. They focus on creating a friendly environment in the classrooms which helps the students in gaining knowledge.
The institute offers undergraduate courses on a foundational platform of science and technology. The students canto opt for more than 50% of courses outside the chosen department. This gives the students the much-needed freedom to develop beneficial knowledge as per his interests along with encompassing proper discipline.
IIT Kanpur, provides all the necessary courses on Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, Biotechnology, and B.Tech, which includes, Aerospace Engineering, Biological Sciences & Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Economics, Earth Sciences, Electrical Engineering, Industrial and Management Engineering, Material Sciences & Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, etc.
Key features
The institution helps students cater to the needs of society with their great inventions and discoveries. It provides world-class facilities to the students and helps them perform the highest level of research works in their particular area of interest. The institution hosts interactive seminars and conferences throughout the year that helps students gaining knowledge about their field. The postgraduate program of IIT Kanpur covers science, engineering, humanities, and management, creating a diverse atmosphere of interdisciplinary interaction. IIT Kanpur also offers Ph.D. to the interested students on academic purposes, merit, further helping them presenting their research papers in many international conferences, organized abroad.
Reasearch
IIT Kanpur also supports research, which is led by small individual research groups with enormous interdisciplinary project teams. The research work highly supports creative work and innovations done by students. It also creates such an environment, which is absolutely suitable for critically managing large mission assignments undertaken by IIT Kanpur.
The research panel houses excellent researchers with amazing talent. They further teach the students and trains them for the upcoming great opportunities approaching on their way. The vibrant research environment of IIT Kanpur is exposed to new and creative ideas. It prepares young researchers to picture their areas of interest in their respective minds.
IIT Kanpur’s academics and research programs train the students with practical knowledge and creative skills, in their particular field of interest.
College Clubs and Communities
Cultural Council
The student Cultural Council of the college Gymkhana organizes loads of programs and extracurricular activities every year, where different colleges are invited to participate and enjoy. The council also organizes interesting workshops and classes every year, especially in summers, in order to provide the students with a creative platform to nurture their talents in cultural arts and genres. The students are provided with chances to improve their skills and compete against the students from other prolific colleges in the intercollege cultural festivals. The duty of the cultural council is to provide the students with ample opportunities to cement their hidden talents. The cultural club also keeps the spirits of the students high through organizing various events at IIT Kanpur, like “Freshers’ Night”, “Impressions” and Galaxy.”
Dance Club
The Dance Club of IIT Kanpur likes to believe that dance is much more than just a hobby or extracurricular activity. Dance defines us, it defines our sole, it defines our personality as a being. Therefore, IIT Kanpur organizes various dance events throughout the year for the students, to keep their enthusiasm in the field of dance intact. The dance club teaches plethora dance styles, including Locking, Popping, Salsa, Jazz, Bollywood, Swag, Walking.
These dance styles and lessons are taught from scratch to all the dance enthusiastic students. The college also conducts various dance extravaganza, like the annual showcase of Dance Club, that allows the students to showcase their brimming talent in dance, eventually making our institute proud. Intercollege festivals and events like Dandiya Night, Yeh Shaam Mastani, Antaragni, Rendezvous, etc are conducted to keep the spirit among the students high.
English Literary Society
William S. Burroughs once said that Language is a virus from outer space, and since then it has become the official motto of the English Literary Society of IIT Kanpur. The English Literary Society is being infectious among the literature buffs, symptoms including urges to celebrate the English language in every form. This society, celebrates the English language through JAMs, Creative Writing, Dumb Charades, Poetry Slam, Debates, Word Games, etc.
Hindi Sahitya Sabha
Hindi Sahitya Sabha promotes the Hindi language in all its forms. The society offers a platform to the interested students who seek to explore vivid avenues of Hindi literature and how it is being relevant to our lifestyle. The society promotes the Hindi language via fun activities such as crosswords, dumb charades and JAM which are juxtaposed to other activities like poetry, debating, and creative writing. It showcases the beauty of Hindi literature that lies within the intertwined lines of poetry.
Fine Arts Club
The Fine Arts Club of IIT Kanpur brings together amazing talents combined with unique artistic maneuvers & the quirky creativity that inspires the colourful world of talent and creation. The Fine Art Club of IIT Kanpur organizes professional workshops and cultural fests, where other colleges are also invited to participate. The club offers students a wide platform to exchange art and techniques, along with developing their own artistic skills. The IIT Kanpur Fine Arts Club continues a legacy of unique art, dedication, hard work and team spirit which helps in unleashing the hidden artist within you.
Music Club
The Music club of IIT Kanpur appreciates wide genres of music starting from rock, metal, blues, jazz, and Hindustani. Students jam and enjoy varieties of music in this club. The music club of IIT Kanpur organizes loads of workshops and activities every year, where the students showcase their musical talent and improve their skills. The music club conducts numerous musical competitions, where students compete against each other over vocals and instrumentals. The club also supports the enthusiastic students to create their new compositions and help them pursue music as a career option in their life. The students keep jamming and creating new music in the club’s recording studio. The students display immense talents in composing their own songs. They make the institution proud by participating and performing amazingly well in the flagship events of the Music club, which is the Musical Extravaganza, organized once in each semester.
Debate & Discussions Society
The Debate and Discussion society of IIT Kanpur provides a platform for enthusiastic students to improve and sharpen their discussion and debating skills. If you are interested in informal discussions, structured Parliamentary Debates, oxford debates & MUN, then this club is the perfect place for you to showcase all your necessary debating skills.
Quiz Club
The Quiz Club organizes, quizzes competitions and workshops regularly for all the knowledgeable buffs in the institution. The quizzes are organized on every topic starting from sports, Entertainment, Technology, Silver Screen, India, space to the common challenges we all face in our particular fields.
Sometimes, quiz meets and quiz week are organized where students participate in maximum numbers. Certain intercollege festivals like Antaragni & Techkriti organize quizzes were they are controlled by proclaimed quizmasters from all over the country. Other quiz events, which are famous all over the country are Nihilanth (conducted by IITs & IIMs), Mood Indigo (conducted by IITB) and Rendezvous (conducted IITD).
College events and festivals
- Antaragni: it is a non-profit organization, which is run and handled by the students of IIT Kanpur. The organization is funded entirely by the Student Gymkhana of IIT Kanpur, from where it was founded. Antaragni currently has a total budget of approximately one crore, which is raised via various sponsorships. It started in 1964 as an inter-collegiate cultural event. The event now houses almost 30,000 visitors from 300 different colleges throughout the country. It is a cultural fest which is helpful in the month of October for four days. The event includes all kinds of music, drama, literary games and quizzes. The event also has its personalized YouTube channel with more than 1,000 subscribers.
- Techkriti: the event started back in 1995 with the purpose of encouraging the growing interest in discoveries, innovation, and technology among the enthusiastic students, in order to offer them a platform where they interact with the outer industries. Techkriti invites notable speakers in the events, to motivate the students and participants. People like APJ Abdul Kalam, Vladimir Voevodsky, Douglas Osheroff, Oliver Smithies, Rakesh Sharma, David Griffiths, and Richard Stallman have joined and cooperated with Techkriti.
- Udghosh: it is an inter-college sports meet, held annually in the month of September. The event includes students participating from all over the country, competing against each other in sports facilities. Moreover, the event also includes Motivational speeches by notable speakers, Mini Marathon, Gymnastic Shows, Sports Quizzes and various other events.
- E-summit: the event started in the year of 2013. The first E-Summit of IIT Kanpur was held between 16-18 August 2013. It is a three days festival, organized by the Entrepreneurship Cell of IIT Kanpur. The event is organized on the theme, “Emerge”. It includes speeches by eminent personalities, interesting workshops, as well as many competitions.
Notable alumni of IIT Kanpur
This list comprises of notable alumni of IIT Kanpur, who have achieved a milestone in their respective fields of career.
- Arvind Krishna the CEO of IBM
- N.R. Narayan Murthy co-founded Infosys
- Manindra Agarwal – Gödel Prize winner for AKS primality test
- Naveen Tiwari – Founder and CEO of InMobi
FAQs:
1) How does the campus life treat the students at IIT Kanpur?
The campus of IIT Kanpur is indeed very beautiful and surrounded by greenery. The campus has a wide range of activities to offer and beautifully constructed infrastructure. The institute has recently inaugurated new enormous lecture halls with futuristic classroom equipment. The campus offers students a National Wind Tunnel Facility, PK Kelkar Library, Taran Taal, which is an Olympic size swimming pool, an International Standard Sports’ Grounds, SIDBI Innovation and Incubation Centre, and world-class research labs with the best equipment.
Students are amazed to see how self-sufficient the campus is. It has cycle repair shops, shopping centres, canteens, a petrol pump, and even a post office. Students don’t usually feel the need to leave the campus, as it has established every necessary resource including, unlimited high-speed internet. The campus, additionally allows you to enjoy free movie screenings in the OAT. It also serves certain food chains like Dominoes and Café Coffee Day, which gives almost 70% discount for the students.
The campus almost feels like home to the students and it keeps them productive all the time.
2) How good is IIT Kanpur’s SURGE Program?
This SURGE-summer internship program of IIT Kanpur is a really dignified program. Only 100-150 students get selected from the thousands of students who apply from all the branches.
The SURGE-summer internship program is one of the best experiences for most of the students, who were a part of it. Apart from that, IIT Kanpur is enormous and full of nicely developed opportunities and internship programs. The campus is vast to explore and the lab work readings along with research papers are a regular resource in these internship programs.
The best thing about the SURGE-summer internship program is you will get a chance to work with M. Tech and Ph.D. students, along with some esteemed faculty members, through which you would be able to enjoy the best learning experience in your internship.
3) How difficult is it to change your branch at IIT Kanpur?
The branch changing policy of IIT Kanpur is quite liberal compared to all the 23 IIT’s. You can change your branch if you manage to score a decent CPI of >8 in your first year. However, there are certain rules which the institution follows while changing the branch.
The rules are as follows:
1) Students get branches according to their preferences and CPI of the 1st year Core subjects.
2) In case of a branch change, two seats get added to each department
3) The existing strength of a particular department should not decrease below 55%.
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