This IIT Madras Course Has 26,000 Students, Aged Between 17 And 82

It’s an academic centre par excellence, rated the No. 1 institution in India for the last eight years in the engineering category. It has the country’s first university-based research park where the industry and academia collaborate to create an innovation ecosystem. Welcome to IIT Madras, which is also the testbed for research and development in some niche and futuristic domains, tailormade to India’s needs.

We have the world’s largest Bachelor of Science (BS) programme, says V Kamakoti, Director of IIT Madras. It’s a four-year online course, with multiple entry and exit points, and currently has close to 26,000 students—the youngest of them is 17 and the oldest is enthusiastic at 82, he told StratNews Global Editor-in-Chief Nitin A. Gokhale.

Another course introduced last year, BS in electronic systems that focuses on semiconductors et al, has about 1000 students enrolled.

Last year, IIT Madras took a leap beyond India’s borders to become the first such institute to open an international campus, in Zanzibar. It took just six months from the time the idea was first discussed to opening the campus, said Kamakoti. The plan is to offer courses in subjects such as infrastructure engineering and maritime engineering.

The research park on the Madras campus, which has been around for 15 years, now has 342 startups with a cumulative valuation of ₹43,000 crore.

Tune in to this exclusive interview where Prof. Kamakoti shares his vision of why a centre of learning and innovation like IIT Madras needs to double up as an institute of entrepreneurship. India needs more employers if it has to realise its dream of becoming a developed nation by 2047, for which students need to be encouraged to pursue entrepreneurship, he says. “If you succeed, it’s good but even if you don’t (which is a learning experience in itself), you can add a credible line to your CV which says—I am a failed entrepreneur.”