IITs: Will they remain Centres of Learning

The placements at all the Indian Institutes of Technology(IITs) have simply been superb this year. The campus was visited by a number of consulting firms, investment banks and equity research firms. It is a great achievement for a technical institute in a third world country to show such a performance.

But as an IIT alumni and a management college student, I have my own reservations. If I look at my batch(2001-02) at IIT Bombay, I see that people are into various fields like higher research, management, civil services, entreprenurship and even politics(see the post below). At our time we had our first interaction with placement office only towards the end of 4th yr(I was in dual degree program). Till then we analysed and thought about various alternative careers available for us. Joining a job immediately after IIT was a least priority.

Infact there were people who talked about opening a startup and some of us didn't use to believe them at that point of time. But now I can see that some of them have actually opened a startup and are performing well. Those who started preparing for civil services in final/semifinal year and now are successful IAS/IPS/IFS. I never thought that Tanmay Rajpurohit and Ajit Shukla will ever enter into politics. But they have..

What I strongly feel about is that IITs should remain centres of learning. IIT system should always encourage students to venture into uncharted territories. They should not become placement agencies as most of our management institutes have become. Aim of IIT is to instill a spirit of questioning and independent thinking in students. Students should organize and participate in extracurrics out of enthusiasm and for learning rather than getting a point in their Resume.

Anyways I admit that most of my fears are unfounded. At our times also there were few who rejected McKinsey & Cap One to go for Phd. And the traditions will continue...

~as always comments are welcome
Tag: IIT||Placements