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IIT Mandi Colloquium organized a talk on From pattern recognition to discovering binomial coefficients on 13th November, 2017. The talk was delivered by Dr. K. Ramasubramanian. . ...... .. .
A full day workshop on various aspects of intellectual property rights covering areas such as Patent, Trademarks, Copyrights, Designs, Geographical Indicators etc was organized by IIT Mandi catalyst on 10th November 2017 by Ms. Sneha Kantikar. ...... .. .
Catalyst Keynote Session on Setting-up a Company by Mr. Aditya Shamlal, Partner, Gamechanger Law Advisor,on 26th October 2017at IIT Mandi. ...... .. .
Catalyst Keynote Session on Product Design by Mr. Aakash Kumar, Associate Director, MakeMyTrip was organized at IIT Mandi on 14th October,2017. Audience members had a chance to learn about the Product Design profession and interact with an industry leader with strong experience designing some of the most successful web products in India. ...... .. .
The one day workshop, Rainfall Induced Landslides: Mapping, Mitigations and Monitoring has been organized at IIT Mandi with support from SDMA-HP (Himachal Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority). The workshop has witnessed 22 external participation apart from 15 from IIT Mandi. The group included practising engineers from NHAI, HPPWD, I&PH, HPSEB, Town Planning and several others from Mandi, Bilaspur and Kullu...... .. .
School of Basic Sciences and Advanced Material Research Center, IIT Mandi organized a conference on the Spectroscopy of Emerging Functional Materials on 9-10 Oct, 2017 at its Kamand campus. The conference aimed to explore the recent developments in the field of functional materials and their study using the spectroscopic techniques. Functional materials have significance importance in various applied areas such as healthcare, agriculture and unconventional source of energy..... .. .
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi marked its Fifth Convocation Ceremony with a solemn event held at its Kamand campus on 7th of October 2017. The Chief Guest for the occasion was Shri. Banmali Agrawala, President – Infrastructure and Defence and Aerospace business of TATA SONS. The occasion also had Shri. Subodh Bhargava, Chairperson of the Board of Governors of IIT Mandi and the former Chairman of TATA Communications Limited, and Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi as eminent personages.... .. .
Mr. Dushyant Singh, an IIT Mandi Alumni of class 2015 hails from Aligarh U.P., scored All India Rank 6 in Indian Engineering Services Exam 2017 in Electrical Engineering. He did his B.Tech from Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, Himachal Pradesh... .. .
As a part of TU9-IIT Mandi exchange programme, IIT Mandi and TU-Berlin have organized a BMBF funded workshop on "Current Trends in Analog Circuit Designing" on september 25-26, 2017. The workshop was organized by Dr. Hitesh Shrimali of IIT Mandi and Prof. Friedel Gerfers of TU-Berlin.. .. .
A short term course and workshop on Adaptronics (Active Shape Control, Active Vibration Control, Active noise Reduction and Structural Health Monitoring) was organized at IIT Mandi during September 20-23, 2017. Nineteen participants from 8 different states attended the event. Among the participants we had Assistant Professors, research scholars from academic and research institutions, students of M.Tech. and B.Tech. .. .
A short term course and workshop on Adaptronics(Active Shape Control, Active Vibration Control, Active noise Reduction and Structural Health Monitoring) was inaugurated at IIT Mandi on September 20, 2017. It is a 4 day event in which the participants are the Assistant Professors, students of Ph.D., M.Tech.,B.Tech. from 8 different states. .. .
Outreach Activity: Laboratory Visits of PG Students, Vallabh Government College, Mandi. IEEE PES-IAS Society of Delhi unit collaborated with NSS Unit, IIT Mandito organize a lab visit of the post-graduate students (Master of Arts, Economics specialization) of Vallabh Government College, Mandion dated 18thSeptember, 2017. Students has visited IIT Mandi Campus at Kamand. Around sixty students and three professors from Vallabh College were welcomed at Kamand campus. .. .
IIT Mandi Botanical Garden which started in July 2015 has completed two years of its establishment. The IIT Mandi community gathered together to access the progress and celebrate on 6th Sept 2017.The event was graced by Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, Dr.Priscilla Gonsalves, several faculties, staff, students and campus residents.. .
On 5th September 2017, student gymkhana organized teacher's day on behalf of IIT Mandi students to express their gratitude and love for their teachers.. .
After five weeks of intense induction program, the first year B.Tech students showcased their learning experience in the 5WIP open house held on Saturday 2nd September. .
Aakarshan is the Introductory Cultural Fest organized at IIT Mandi on 19th August,2017 by the students of various clubs.
The 71st Independence Day was celebrated at IIT Mandi. The event started with hoisting of flag by Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. It was followed by, the guard of honour by the security staff and pledge ceremony by all, which was led by Mr. Sushil Kumar, Registrar IIT Mandi.
The IIT Mandi Colloquium Team arranged talk on Indian Vultures, an endangered species on 11th August 2017. The talk was delivered by Dr. Vibhu Prakash, Deputy Director and Principal Scientist [Ornithology] with Bombay Natural History Society. He has an experience of over 37 years in the field of Ornithology. He has headed the vulture conservation project of the Society and currently based at Pinjore, Haryana.
The National Handloom Day was celebrated at IIT Mandi campus on Aug 5, 2016. The chief guest was Prof. Timothy. A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi and the Special Guest was the Pradhan of Kamand Panchayat, Smt. Reeta Devi.
IIT Mandi extends a warm welcome to its new batch of B. Tech students, who are joining the Institute in the first week of August. The registration process starts on 1st August 2017. The students, accompanied by their parents, reached Mandi from all parts of India on 31st July 2017
The first Salters' Chemistry camp was held in Himachal Prasesh at IIT Mandi. Around 62 students came to IIT Mandi for a three day residential camp conducted by The Royal Society of Chemistry, India and the Salters Institute, UK. The camp was for Class IX students at IIT Mandi, Kamand from July 3 – 6, 2017. IIT Mandi had this opportunity to host around 62 school students from various parts of Mandi district
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA one of world's top ranking technological institutions is joining hand with Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi and IIT Delhi to conduct a 10-day social innovation boot camp at IIT Mandi. About 50 students of several IITs and engineering colleges across India, along with students from Australia, ASB Malaysia and MIT USA are participating.
One week short Term Course on Modeling Simulation using Finite Element Method for Engineering Applications (MSFEMEA) was organised from June 19th-23rd, 2017 at IIT Mandi. The short term course was inaugurated by Prof. Timothy. A. Gonsolves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his Inaugural speech, he highlighted the importance of modeling & simulation in engineering. He also cautioned the participants against blind over–reliance on software's that could lead to accidents.
IIT Mandi B.Tech. Student Mr. Nitesh Kumar has won the Gold Medal (MS SL3) for India at FZ Forza Irish Para-Badminton International, 2017 on 25th June, 2017. The tournament was held in National stadium at Dublin, Ireland from 22 to 25th June 2017. It was the 3rd episode of the tournament. Mr. Nitesh Kumar participated as a contingent member of Indian Para-Badminton Association. It is a very proud moment for our Country as well as for the whole IIT Mandi family.
The Multimedia Analytics and Systems group of the School of Computing and Electrical Engineering at IIT Mandi organised the third Workshop on Machine Learning for Medical Image Analysis (WMLMIA 2017.) The five day workshop focused on the use of machine learning for analysing microscopy images. The workshop was held between 17-21 June, 2017 at the Kamand campus, IIT Mandi.
A three day Workshop on 'A Multi Dimensional Smart Energy Grids Analysis for Indian Scenario' organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) during June 08-10, 2017. The Workshop was inaugurated by Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his inaugural address, Prof. Gonsalves highlighted the accomplishment and research activities of IIT Mandi.
On 2nd June 2017, a modern multi sports complex was inaugurated by former Director of IIT Bombay, Prof. Ashok Mishra, in presence of our Director Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Dean Students Dr. Suman Kalyan Pal, Sport-Advisor Dr. Rajendra Kr. Ray.
IIT Mandi has organized a seminar on zero waste campus by efficient waste management in the campus on 29th May , 2017. The speaker of the seminar was Dr. Meenakshi Bharath, who is not only a gynecologist and fertility specialist, but also a green campaigner, an advocate for clean India. In the last two days, Dr. Meenakshi Bharath along with green committee members launched 6 hour door-to-door campaign in staff and faculty residents and demonstrated 3 ways segregation.
On 21st May 2017, IIT Mandi witnessed an exemplary demonstration of low cost technology prototypes for solving problems of society. These prototypes were developed by students as part of their Design Practicum course IC201P.
On 21th May 2017, IIT Mandi hosted their graduation dinner, in the Community Centre, North Campus, for all the batches passing out this year. There are around 150 students graduating, of which 117 are regular B.tech students, 8 PhD, 3 MS, 18 MSc and 4 are MTech students.
Technical Society of IIT Mandi conducted intra-college technical festival Aavishkar on 20th May 2017. Several technical projects and club activities were showcased.
The School of Humanities organised a distinguised lecture on 17th May 2017. The lecture, titled 'Fear and Courage: Reflections on a Neglected Episode in Modern Indian History', was delivered by Prof. Indivar Kamtekar of the Centre for Historical Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
TEDx was conducted on 14th May, 2017 at Kamand Campus. The marquee event was organized for the first time in IIT Mandi by a team led by 4th year students Vivek Sharma and Sagar Ghai.
BioX Centre Inaugurated on May 13th by Professor K. VijayRaghavan, Secretary,
Dept. of Biotechnology, Govt.of India.
Faculty & staff club organized the 1st Inter Departmental cricket tournament involving 8 teams from Mandi district in April 2017. The tournament was inaugurated by chief guest Shri Mohammad
, Registrar IIT Mandi. The eight teams that participated are Inter IIT Mandi team, CPWD, Forest XI, HDFC, Bar council, Friends XI (outsource), Animal Husbandy XI and the Postal & telecommunication.
The Second "Earth Day" was celebrated on 22nd
April 2017. This time, the Environmental Club students of IIT Mandi, along with Green Panel and NSS celebrated the Earth Day.
Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi and Chairperson of Green Panel participated in all the events and encouraged the group of enthusiastic students for celebrating the Earth Day by spreading awareness through all the events organised by them.
The yearly institute event, 6th Exodia' 17 , was organised from 7th - 9th April 2017 was best and bigger this time. A number of technical and cultural events were organised by the IIT Mandi students. Many universities, institutes and colleges' students around the country had participated in these events.
5th Inter IIT Tech Meet was held at IIT Kanpur from 25th March to 26th March, 2017. 9 teams from IIT Mandi participated in events like Product Exhibition, Human Computer Interaction, Stock Market Analysis, Software making event - Dashboard, Astronomy event. Total 12 IITs participated in the meet. Stock Market Analysis team comprising Priyansh Saxena, Siddhant Kumar, Abhigyan Khaund, Neha Muthiyan bagged the first position and Human Computer Interaction team comprising Kushagra Singhal, Abhay Singh Chauhan, Akash Sharma, Piyush Anand bagged the second position. IIT Mandi ranked 4th in overall championship in the tech meet after IIT Kanpur, IIT Kharagpur and IIT Roorkee. Website: http://interiit.tech/
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA one of world's top ranking technological institutions is joining hand with Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi and IIT Delhi to conduct a 10-day social innovation boot camp at IIT Mandi. About 50 students of several IITs and engineering colleges across India, along with students from Australia, ASB Malaysia and MIT USA are participating.
Nitesh Kumar has won Silver medal in singles and Bronze medal in mixed doubles in 1st National para Badminton Championship 2017
The Training program was on the topic "Advance Mathematics for Researchers in Engineering Field" in Engineering.
The focus of the workshop was to expose students to the possibilities and opportunities related to IoT systems. Dr. Samar Agnihotri inaugurated the workshop. Dr. Atul Singh Minhas, Univ. of Liverpool, UK was the eminent invited visitor speaker and Dr. Srikant Srinavasan was the in-house speaker.
Around 20 enthusiastic Faculty members participated and benefited from this program. Prof. T. A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi welcomed the new faculty and briefed them about the vision and mission of IIT Mandi.The Director also mentioned about the structure and uniqueness of IIT Mandi.
In 2009, IIT Mandi's stone was laid on the very same day at Kamand to mark the beginning of this Institute. Now, the vast majority of its 800 students and 100 faculty are residing in the Kamand campus.
The Design and Innovation Centre is a project funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Govt. of India. The centre is equipped enough to support the prototype and product development endeavors of the students and faculty members of IIT Mandi.
This 3-day workshop was organised by National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM), at IIT Mandi. Prof. Chandan Ghosh and Dr. Anil K Gupta from NIMD were among the dignitaries.
Prof. Subrata Ray (Distinguished Visiting Professor, School of Engineering) inaugurated the Book Fair, organised by the Central Library IIT Mandi. The fair was first of it's kind at IIT Mandi and was very much appreciated by the IIT Mandi community.
Professor T. A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi congratulated the MAS Lab team members, Anshul Thakur (PhD scholar), Jyothi Jain (project associate), Dr. Padmanabhan Rajan (Asst. Professor, SCEE) and Dr. A. D. Dileep (Asst. Professor, SCEE).
On the occasion of the 68th Republic Day of our Nation, Prof. T. A. Gonsalves (Director, IIT Mandi), hoisted the National Flag and addressed the gathering, emphasizing about the constitution of India and explained the role of IITs in the nation building.
In the year 2016 IIT Mandi has seen continual growth and has begun making its mark in the world. The Year 2017 holds promise of much more progress and excitement.
IIT Mandi in collaboration with IEEE PES society organized an institute lab visit and painting competition on theme "Energy Saving and Innovations in the Usage of Renewable Energy" for the students of Saraswati Vidya Mandir Senior Secondary School, Mahajan Bazaar, Mandi.
After the successful completion of the 1st workshop on Pahari painting, many students, staff and faculty members showed a keen interest to learn this art form and signed up for the 2nd workshop which was held at the Kamand Campus of IIT Mandi.
Photography and Movie Club, IIT Mandi, organized the 2nd Photography Workshop during 11th -13th November, 2016. Ms. Kartiki S. Gonsalves was the invited expert of the workshop.
After the nearly complete establishment of the South Campus of IIT Mandi at Kamand, now the North Campus at Salgi has started to become functional, with the shifting of the Director, few faculty with their family and PG students.
Deepanshu secured AIR-58 in Engineering Services Examination-2015, conducted by UPSC for recruitment of the central government services that meet the technical and managerial functions.
The club plans to regularly organize music, dance and painting classes for kids and also organise social get-together on national days and festivals.
The workshop focused on chemical science works in the field of human health, environment & sustainability and energy and provided a unique opportunity for sharing research expertise and networking between Indian and UK researchers.
In this Convocation Ceremony, a total of 140 students received their degrees: 7 Ph.D. scholars, 5 M.S. (by research) students, 3 M.Tech., 10 M.Sc. (Chemistry) and 115 B.Tech. students. The efforts and achievements of exceptional students were recognized and rewarded.
The workshop, which was attended by 12 faculty participants, covered various aspects of teaching and learning, including what constitutes good teaching, planning to teach and teaching methods.
Along with developing advanced technology much needed for the Himalayan Region, IIT Mandi is also determined to preserve its rich cultural heritage. Towards this, a first of its kind workshop (funded by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India) was organised at IIT Mandi.
The General Trophy was won by Chitkara University, Punjab (with 44 points), whereas IIT Mandi and JUIT ended up being the Runners-up (tie, with 38 points).
The course was particularly beneficial for engineers and scientists working in structural, fluidflow, environmental, geo-technical, thermal engineering, research organizations, Govt. R&D departments, consulting companies, and self-employed practitioners engaged in the analysis, design, planning, construction, operation, maintenance and management.
The main objective of this Workshop was to facilitate the forum to discuss the various low carbon energy sources in active distribution system and methodologies to achieve a more efficient and environmentally friendly grid operation.
On 15th August, 2016, IIT Mandi celebrated the 70th Independence Day of India, with much enthusiasm. It was a good opportunity for the new students/scholars to get a glimpse of the rich cultural edge of IIT Mandi.
On Saturday, 6th August 2016, 20 new PG students made history by being the first batch to shift into the North Campus at Kamand. Earlier in 2012, first batch of students, the Director and few faculties shifted to Kamand (South Campus), which is now a fully residential campus with all the facilities.
A focused meeting on the "Opportunities in Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (OMAP-2016) in H.P" was held at IIT Mandi on 30 th July 2016. The meeting successfully brought together 74 participants including farmers, scientists, research scholars and industrialists of Himachal Pradesh.
The focus was differential equations, which is an integral part of many engineering problem. The training program was designed primarily for faculty members from Government engineering college Rajkot, Gujarat.
The program, named ISHAN VIKAS – STEP, is a joint initiative of the Central Government and IIT Mandi, and is aimed at motivating bright high school students from these states to go for higher studies in field related to science and engineering.
The Multimedia, Analytics and Systems Group of the School of Computing and Electrical Engineering, IIT Mandi organized a five-day workshop on Machine Learning for Medical Image Analysis, from 18-22 June 2016. This is the second workshop of this kind at IIT Mandi after the one held in 2015.
People across the country and abroad celebrated the 2nd International Yoga Day, today on the 21st of June 2016. IIT Mandi also celebrated it with the rest of the world.
Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves (Director, IIT Mandi), launched issue-2 of the technical magazine of IIT Mandi - 'ESSENT'. The Director congratulated the coordinator and the whole team of SCRI (Society For Collaborative Research And Innovation)- IIT Mandi on the occasion.
NSS-IIT Mandi (Medical Unit, IIT Mandi), in collaboration with Blood Bank Zonal Hospital, Mandi, organised a Blood Donation Camp on 27th May 2016. On this occasion the students, staff and faculty of IIT Mandi participated voluntarily. The camp ended successfully with the safe collection and transportation of about 50 units of blood to the zonal blood bank, Mandi.
IIT Mandi celebrated the imminent graduation of over 140 students on 20th May 2016. On this occasion Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, said "This is a historic graduation: we have our first M.Sc and M.Tech students graduating this year". The Director congratulated the graduating students and their teachers for the historic achievement as the first batch to have both bachelors and masters by coursework. He also forwarded his Best Wishes to the graduating students for future endeavors.
The Industry-Academia Conclave on May 15 was organized amid a purposeful and enthusiastic participation by the attendees. Over 100 attendees consisting of representatives from the industry and academia came together and held discussions around the Conclave's theme, "Technology & Business Innovation at IIT Mandi".
It is a proud moment for all, at the alma mater of Mr. Aamir. In his mail to the Director, he stated "I am proud to be an alumnus of IIT Mandi". And also expressed his thankfulness to the Director, faculty and student community of IIT Mandi for the support, guidance and love.
On 7 th May 2016, the Big Data workshop was held at IIT Mandi. The objective of the workshop was to give the students exposure to the area of Big Data Analytics and an opportunity to present their projects. The schedule included expert lectures, interactive sessions and poster presentation session. Distinguished speakers were invited from different institutions, namely, DFKI, IIT Hyderabad, IBM Research and IIIT Delhi. The audience included MS/Ph.D. and B.Tech Students of CS 561 - Big Data and Map Reduce (by Dr. Arti Kashyap) and faculty members of IIT Mandi.
In January 2016, IIT Mandi, was selected as one of 18 sites across the country for setting up Technology Business Incubators (TBIs) under the Government's 'Start-Up India' initiative. Initial funding is being provided by IIT Mandi and the National Science & Technology Entrepreneurship Development Board of the department of Science & Technology to setup IIT Mandi Catalyst, a Section 8 company for technology business incubation.
IIT Mandi observed Earth Day on 22nd April 2016. The Green Panel organised events on 22nd and 23rd April. Events like Art competition (Theme - "SAVE OUR MOTHER EARTH"), Cleanliness Drive, and presentations on - "Solid Waste Management", "Rainwater Harvesting" and "Waste Management in campus, were held to create awareness and involve the campus community in our responsibility towards environmental protection. The NSS team, students, faculties, staffs and campus kids were present in the event headed by Prof. Bhavendra Paul.
Another milestone, First building in our North Campus inaugurated. The school is the 1st building to be occupied in the North Campus of IIT Mandi. Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves cut the ribbon to inaugurate the IIT Mandi Takshila Primary School in the presence of the Director, Deans, Registrar, members of the faculty, staff, members of the community and parents.
Exodia, the annual technical-cultural festival of IIT Mandi is all set for its 5th edition. Exodia '16 starts today i.e on April 8th (Friday) and shall conclude on the night of April 10th (Sunday). The technical events invite the inquisitive minds to apply their knowledge of science and technology to solve day-to-day problems and the cultural events outline the ideas and culture of people coming from diverse backgrounds and geographies. Exodia Event Planner.
IIT Mandi hosted the 153rd Director's Meet on 26th March 2016 in its main campus. The Director's Meet is held biannually to deliberate policy related common issues of IIT concerns.
IIT Mandi celebrated its 7th Foundation Day today, on 24th February 2016. Dr. Sanjay Kumar (Director, Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology), Palampur, was the Chief Guest for the function.
Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves (Director, IIT Mandi) signed a MoU with McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario on 3rd February 2016. McMaster is one of Canada's top universities and one of the leading research universities worldwide. Prof. Peter Mascher, Associate Vice-President International Affairs signed for McMaster.
The award was conferred during the 7th ISEES (International Society for Energy, Environment and Sustainability) International Workshop on Sustainable Energy, Environment & Safety with Railway Centric Theme, 21st-23rd December, 2015.
The 4th Inter IIT Tech Meet was held at IIT Mandi during 29-31 January, 2016. Participants from 9 different IITs came together during the event. The event was a pan IIT event which comprises of various IITs coming together and competing. Link to the site. To find the the rule book for various events click here.
A training programme on "Part Modeling, Assembly Modeling and Production Drawing for Engineers and Designers" was organized by School of Engineering IIT Mandi during 25-27 January 2016.Creation of a virtual 3-D model is the very first step of the product development process. A 3-D virtual model provides all the basic information which is essential in the pre-processing step in finite element analysis (FEA) or computational fluid dynamics (CFD).
IIT Mandi celebrated this day with patriotism, enthusiasm and unity. Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, hoisted the national flag and addressed the gathering. During his speech the Director, IIT Mandi described regarding provisions and parts of the constitution of India; fundamental rights and fundamental duties mentioned in parts III & V; emphasized on applicable duties of ours being engineers and academicians. Further he deliberated on possibilities of human cooperation with and in favor of wild animals in Himachal. Security personnel, faculty, staff and students present there saluted the national flag.
A 7-day short term course on "Computer Aided Engineering: Applied FEM and CFD" was held at IIT Mandi during 18-24th January 2016. The course drew participants both from academia and industry. Participants were trained on wide range of modelling techniques in FEM and CFD along with the theoretical aspect behind the techniques.
A conference/discussion meeting on "Advances in Electron Spectroscopy - Experiment and Theory (AESET 2016)" was conducted at IIT Mandi during 18th to 21st January 2016. The main aim of the meeting was to discuss recent advances in the field of electron spectroscopy and microscopy, and future directions. This meeting was the second of the series. The first one was organized in GÖttingen, Germany.
Design Innovation Center, IIT Mandi organised a two-day workshop on Product Design and Innovation at Kamand campus on 18-19 December 2015. The workshop drew participants from all over the country. Prof. B.D Chaudhary (Dean Academics), Prof. Ramesh Oruganti (Advisor to Dean SRIC), Prof. M. Balakrishnan (IIT Delhi), Prof. P.V.M Rao (IIT Delhi), Dr. Rajnesh Sharma (IIT Mandi), Dr. Rajeev Kumar (IIT Mandi) and Dr. Om Prakash Singh (IIT Mandi) delivered lectures and interacted with the participants. Following themes were covered: integrating product design and innovation in curricula, how and what it takes to take the design ideas to product level, concept product designing, intellectual property rights (IPR), how to the write patent claims and reverse engineering.
The paper titled "A Family of Example-Specific Density based Matching Kernels for Classification of Varying Length Patterns of Speech using Support Vector Machines", authored by Abhijeet Sachdev (MS student, IIT Mandi), A. D. Dileep (Assistant Professor, SCEE, IIT Mandi) and Veena Thenkanidiyoor (Assistant Professor, Dept. of CSE, NIT Goa), was presented in the '2nd International Conference on Soft Computing and Machine Intelligence (ISCMI2015)'.
This conference was organized by the International Neural Network Society (INNS) India regional chapter, during November 23-24, 2015 at Hong Kong. The main objective of ISCMI 2015 is to present the latest research and results of scientists related to soft computing & machine intelligence topics.
The above mentioned paper received the "INNS Best Paper Award" among all the papers accepted in the conference. The paper addressed the issues in classifying the varying length patterns of speech using support vector machines (SVM). In this paper authors have proposed a novel example-specific density based kernel. Authors have showed improved performance for the tasks such as speech emotion recognition and speaker identification when the proposed kernel was used with SVM-based classifier.
The President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Dr. Joachim Gauck, has conferred upon Prof. Pramod Talgeri (visiting faculty in IIT Mandi's School of Humanities and Social Sciences) the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in recognition of his outstanding achievements in promoting Indo-German cultural interaction and deepening the relations between Germany and India.
The Order of Merit is the highest civilian tribute the Federal Republic of Germany bestows on individuals for services to the nation. The Order of Merit is awarded to Germans as well as foreigners for their life-long achievements in the political, economic, social or intellectual realm.
It was instituted in 1951 by Federal President Theodor Heuss. It is the highest tribute the Federal Republic of Germany pays to individuals for their life-long contributions in their field.
In 2014 Prof. Talgeri was also honoured by another prestigious award, "Merck- Award", for life-long service in the field of teaching of German Studies, which is instituted by the German pharmaceutical firm E. Merck and the German Foreign Office and Max Mueller Bhawan and is given every two years.
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi in collaboration with National Programme on Differential Equations: Theory, Computation and Applications (NPDE‐TCA), funded by DST, IIT Bombay organized a 5‐day advanced level workshop on "Controllability of Heat and Wave Equations" during November 16 - 20, 2015 at IIT Mandi.
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi marked its Third Convocation Ceremony with a solemn event on 31st October, 2015. The Chief Guest on the occasion was Prof. N. Sathyamurthy, Director, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Mohali. Among other dignitaries present were the Guests of Honour, Mr. M. Natarajan (Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi) and Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves (Director, IIT Mandi). IIT Mandi also received congratulatory messages from the President of India and the Minister of Human Resource Development on the occasion.
In the Convocation Ceremony, a total of 115 students received their degrees: 105 B. Tech. students, 7 M.S. (by research) students, and 3 Ph.D. scholars. The efforts and achievements of exceptional students were recognized and rewarded. Mr. Sachin S. Bhat was awarded the President of India Gold Medal and institute Silver Medal for overall excellence in academics and top performance in Computer Engineering. Mr. Prashant Prazapati was awarded Director's Gold Medal for all around excellence in academics and extra-curricular activities. Mr. Prazapati was also awarded the Balasundaram Endowment Prize for German. Mr. Ingale Swapnil Sushil received the Institute Silver Medal for top performance in Mechanical Engineering; and, Miss Nidhi Manoj Makhijani got the Rani Gonsalves Memorial Medal for best performance among girl students of B. Tech. batch.
The Convocation Ceremony, held at the Institute's permanent campus at Kamand, began at 3:30 pm with the national anthem. Shri Natarajan declared the Convocation open. The opening was followed by the welcome speech and report by the Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his report, the Director emphasized the development of IIT Mandi in the past six years, both on academic and administrative fronts. He outlined the achievements of faculty and students in the recent years. He noted that the Institute faculty had published a total of 451 international publications up to this present academic year. Also, that some of the best companies in the world, including Amazon, Cisco, Cognizant, Infosys, Microsoft, Samsung, L&T, TCS and Tata Motors had recruited students from the campus.
The 3rd Convocation of Indian Institute of Technology Mandi has been scheduled to be held on 31st October, 2015. Prof. N. Sathyamurthy, Director, IISER Mohali will be the Chief Guest of the function. The detailed Schedule and Minute to Minute Program will be announced shortly. Dr. Bharat Singh Rajpurohit, Dean (Faculty) is nominated as Coordinator and the Registrar, IIT Mandi will be the Nodal Officer for 3rd Convocation event.
The President of India is pleased to approve the renewal of contract of Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director IIT-Mandi for another five years w.e.f 15th January 2015 vide Order No. F.No. 16-23/2014-TS.I (Sectt.) dt. 31st August 2015.
We the students, faculty and staff at IIT Mandi are overwhelmed with this news. IIT Mandi is rapidly growing under the esteemed guidance of Prof. Gonsalves. We look forward with him to elevate the standards of IIT Mandi to be at par with all the other premier institutes of the world.
On this occasion Prof. Gonsalves said "I have just received an order informing me that the President of India has approved my 2nd term as Director, up to 14th January 2020. I am honored by this mark of appreciation for the remarkable growth of IIT Mandi in the remote Kamand Valley. This growth was possible only through the selfless efforts of numerous faculty, students, staff, alumni and well-wishers in building this IIT. Especial thanks to my wife, Priscilla, who has been a constant source of inspiration and ideas, while tempering my rasher initiatives. She has driven the humane side of the Institute through Book Nook, the campus Creche and School, assorted recreational activities for families and projects for the benefit of the surrounding villages. Thanks also to the People of India who have generously funded IIT Mandi and to whose development and well being this enterprise is dedicated!
With the enthusiasm and drive of the IIT Mandi community, I am confident that the next 5 years will see this young Kamand Valley institution rising to new heights of academic accomplishment. I am sure that we will be responsible for technological advances that will benefit the Himalayan region, that we will see a blossoming of hi-tech industry in the vicinity of Mandi, and that IIT Mandi will continue to surprise one and all by its achievements. I look forward to scaling the heights and overcoming the challenges ahead with help from each one of you."
On 15th August, 2015, IIT Mandi celebrated the 69th Independence Day of India. The celebrations began by the hoisting of the national flag by Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi, which was followed by the guard of honour by the security staff. The Director shared his thoughts with the students and faculty emphasizing on the need to be rational in thinking and having tolerance for the views of the others. Professor Mark Yoder, visiting professor from the United States, also shared his views on the ocassion. The gathering was also addressed by two girls of the fresher batch, Mamta Bhagia and Deveshi Soni. Students put up a scintillating cultural program including patriotic songs and a group dance. Col. Devang Naik (retd) rendered the vote of thanks. The celebrations concluded with high tea and sweets.
With the start of a new academic year, IIT Mandi welcomed a fresh batch of budding engineers and scientists. An extensive orientation program was organized by the Guidance and Counseling Service to acquaint them with the institute and to facilitate a smooth transition into new life at IIT Mandi.
The undergraduate students had a week long orientation from 2nd to 8th of August. B.Tech students from all over India arrived at Kamand campus on 2nd of August to join for B.Tech in Computer Science and Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and IIT Mandi's first ever batch of Civil Engineering. The Director and Deans welcomed the students and interacted with parents during the Welcome function held on 3rd. The admission formalities were also completed on 3rd. Senior students and staff members provided necessary assistance to perform various formalities like registration, identity card making, bank account opening, and mobile connection.
During the orientation week the students were treated to various indoor and outdoor activities to get acquainted with IIT Mandi and its surroundings. Throughout the week English club was organized by a group of faculty members to improve their language skills. Some of the class room sessions include session on what is engineering, over view of different disciples, academic structure, essential student oriented services, and flora and fauna of Kamand campus. A workshop on "life skills" was organized for the freshmen. The workshop had sessions on communication skills, personality development, time management and stress management.
The students participated in a series of informal and outdoor activities during the afternoons and evenings. Informal activities started with 'fresher mixer' on 2nd evening and included activities such as, hiking, computer gaming, treasure hunt, scavenger hunt, movie screening, and board games. These events provided a fun filled and enthusiastic start for their stay at IIT Mandi. A total of 135 B.Tech students have joined IIT Mandi this year.
Delegates from Purdue Pharma L.P., a pharmaceutical company located in Stamford, Connecticut, USA, visited Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi on 21st and 22nd July, 2015. The delegation from Purdue Pharma included, Mr. Larry A. Pickett, Jr., Vice President & Chief Information Officer; Mr. Sayee Natarajan, Director, Systems Development and Business Analytics; and, Mr. Nataraj Dasgupta, Data Scientist and Senior Lead. The delegation discussed potential collaborative projects in diverse research areas with the faculty and students of the Institute.
In a talk given by Purdue Pharma to the Institute faculty and students, the company highlighted the potential of using technologies like KDB+, which could allow companies to reduce time, cost, and effort on IT projects involving large amounts of data. Later, the Purdue delegates met with faculty from different schools as well as graduate and undergraduate students located on campus.
IIT Mandi has an on-going collaboration with Purdue Pharma on a project that is worth close to USD 100,000. The project deals with machine learning and data mining for sales and analytics in pharma. The objective of the project is to study how social network analysis, patient journey and social media information could be used for finding prescribing histories and relationship among doctors in order to improve and provide the best health care for patients. Dr. Varun Dutt, Assistant Professor, School of Computing and Electrical Engineering, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Mandi is the principal investigator on the project. Dr. Dutt is assisted by Abhinav Choudhury and Shruti Kaushik, who are working as project staff.
The current interaction between IIT Mandi and Purdue Pharma is believed to create further research opportunities between the two organizations. Purdue is a privately held US company part of Mundi Pharma worth more than USD 4 billion that is known for its medical products such as OxyContin, Butrans, and several other products such Betadine and Senokot laxatives.
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi organized a four day short term course on "Practical Finite Element Method" and one day workshop on "Applications of Smart Materials" during 13-17 July. Prof. T. A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi inaugurated the program. Dr. Rajeev Kumar briefed about the coverage of the course and workshop. The course comprises of 10 lectures and 17 hours lab sessions followed by a workshop incorporating 8 talks.
In his inaugural, Prof. T. A. Gonsalves emphasized the importance of designing a product and owning its Intellectual Property Rights. He said that cut throat competition in the market puts tremendous pressure on the corporations to launch reasonably priced products in short time, making them to rely more on virtual tools (CAD/CAE) accelerate the design and development of products. As dependability of the industries on virtual tools increases, so it is the responsibility of the finite element analysts to provide results with most accuracy within available resources and time constrains. He also briefed the importance of smart materials to reduce the cost of product.
The above one day workshop was conducted by IIT Mandi, on 17th July, 2015. During his talk, Dr. Jens Twiefel, Research Manager, Leibniz University Hannover Germany, briefed about ultrasonic actuators and shared his experience about ultrasonic levitation, ultrasonic friction reduction in bearing, tillage, and pneumatic actuator, ultrasonic assisted deep hole drilling, piezoelectric & ultrasonic motors, and ultrasonic powder transport. Prof. B.N. Singh, Head of the Department of Aerospace Engineering, IIT Kharagpur discussed some very important studies on smart composite structures. He also introduced the applications of shape memory alloys in aerospace technology. Prof. Michael Sinapius, Member of Board of Directors, German Aerospace Center, Braunschweig, Germany explained active noise control inside aircraft and active shape control for aircraft wings during takeoff and landing. Dr. Rajeev Kumar, School of Engineering IIT Mandi discussed the different applications of smart materials in space. He briefed application of piezoelectric material in vibration & shape control of space craft antenna reflector, space robot, microsystem for space applications, deployment of satellites, and instrument positioning. Mr. Chanderkant Susheel emphasized on the importance of functional graded piezoelectric material for the vibration and shape control of smart structures. Mr. Tarun Verma discussed the applications of smart material for the energy harvesting. Mr.Vishrut Shah summarized different types of smart materials and their applications.
During valedictory, Prof. B.N. Singh distributed certificates to the 33 participants from Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu.
IIT Mandi, committed to its eco-management plans and outreach activities has inaugurated the Botanical Garden in its main campus at Kamand. Several plant species endemic to the area, of high value and endangered, have been planted. These include species of fruit trees, bioengineering plants, medicinal and aromatic plants. The event was inaugurated by
Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, and Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves, who initiated the plantation. Apart from the faculty, staff and students, the event was participated by other dignitaries from District forest office and Nature Biotech Products Industry from Baggi, Mandi.
Towards the establishment of the Botanical Garden, a team consisting of nursery workers from Kamand area, expert horticulturists and plant science researchers are involved. The team under the charge of Dr. Shyam Masakapalli and a noted local consultant Dr. Chiranjit Parmar has plans in place to expand the collection of plants including the rare and endangered from the state of Himachal Pradesh and elsewhere, along with their conservation, documentation and digitization. Apart from the eco-mapping study conducted at the Kamand valley, ongoing activities include setting up of herbarium, maintenance of the herbal garden and organizing outreach activities as a part of IIT Mandi's eco-management strategy.
A five day Workshop on Machine Learning for Medical Image Analysis (WMLMIA 2015) was organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) during June 24-28, 2015.
The workshop was inaugurated on June 24, in the presence of Prof. Timothy Gonsalves (Director, IIT Mandi), Prof. Ramesh Oruganti (Dean (Academics), IIT Mandi), and Prof. B.D. Chaudhary (Dean (Sponsored Research and Industrial Consultancy), IIT Mandi). During the inauguration, they highlighted the importance of technology in healthcare, and that of interdisciplinary interactions in this area.
The workshop was organized with the objective of improving the awareness of research in medical image analysis, among young researchers, both from theoretical and practical perspectives. It also aimed to facilitate the intermingling and networking of domain experts in machine learning and medical image analysis, from academia and industry, and medical practitioners.
On Sunday, 21st June, 2015, IIT Mandi celebrated the International Day of Yoga with the rest of the world.
The program began at 7:15 a.m. in The Lounge with a welcome address by Prof. B. Subramanian, Dean of Students. The Dean explained the meaning and the necessity for Yoga as physical excise for a sound body and mind. Then Ms. Dimple Saini and Ms. Manisha Sharma, yoga instructors, gave a belief introduction and the yoga practice began with a prayer.
Several students, staff members and school students visiting IIT Mandi from Assam took part in the event.
The yoga session ended at 8:30 a.m. with Shanti Path and with a vote of thanks by Shri Mohammad Shakeel, Registrar, IIT Mandi.
An unfortunate incident took place in the morning of 20.6.2015 involving the contractors' staff and labourers at the North Campus construction site of IIT Mandi at Kamand. IIT and its community is extremely saddened by the incident. We express our heartfelt sympathies to those injured and our condolences to the bereaved families.
The academic activities and residences of IIT Mandi are so far confined to the South Campus, which is about 3 kms away from the North Campus. IIT assures the parents and guardians of the students and research scholars that their children/wards are carrying out their academic activities peacefully in the safety of the South Campus of IIT Mandi.
The construction work of the North Campus (Hostels, Faculty housing and dining blocks) was entrusted to CPWD under Deposit work Scheme. CPWD on their part had awarded the work to Supreme Infrastructure Ltd. Gurgaon. CPWD has a permanent camp office on the site to check and supervise the day to day construction work. Progress of construction work and technical issues are reviewed by IIT Mandi periodically.
A representation dated 27th May 2015 addressed to Assistant Commissioner EPF at Shimla was received by IIT Mandi from H.P. Bhawan Awam Sadak Nirman Mazdoor Union on 27.5.2015 stating non-payment of EPF amount to the workers' EPF accounts. Reacting immediately on the representation, The Registrar, IIT Mandi forwarded it to CPWD on 28.5.2015 for necessary action. CPWD informed that there had been negotiations between the workers union and the contractors, and an agreement was reached on 17th June, 2015.
On receiving a call from the Deputy Commissioner, Mandi on 19th June 2015 related to workers EPF and wages issues, Registrar, IIT Mandi called an urgent meeting which was attended by CPWD and Supreme Infrastructure. In the meeting, CPWD and Supreme Infrastructure assured to (i) pay the pending wages for the month of May to workers by 20th June 2015 and (ii) settle the EPF issues by 23rd Jun 2015 as was mutually agreed in negotiations on 17th June, 2015. The agreement document was also submitted by the Contractor in the meeting which was signed by the contractor's representatives and some workers' Union representatives. The DC, Mandi was appraised by the Registrar immediately about the outcome of the meeting and it appeared that workers' issues had been resolved.
On 20th June, 2015 it was reported that some workers gathered at the construction site in the morning and it led finally to the unfortunate incident of loss of life of some employees of the contractor and injuries to others. IIT, in the past, has taken the stand that there should be no arms in the construction site even on the plea of occasional incursion of wild animals. Since IIT does not have any presence in the construction site even through its own security, we are unaware as to how firearms entered the scene of the unfortunate incident.
IIT appeals to the local communities to stand by it in its endeavour to create an Institute for which the entire State of Himachal Pradesh will be proud.
A three day Workshop on 'Computational Intelligence Techniques for Smart Grid Applications' organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) during May 28-30, 2015.
The Workshop was inaugurated by Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his inaugural address, Prof. Gonsalves highlighted the accomplishment and research activities of IIT Mandi. He had also shared the vision of IIT Mandi, as an Institute 'to be a leader in science and technology education, knowledge creation and innovation, in an India marching towards a just, inclusive and sustainable society' and one of its thrust area 'to devise globally recognized solutions for the problems of society and industry, particularly in the fragile eco-system of the Himalayas'. He emphasized the relevance of this timely Workshop by which different groups of society can come together to solve the challenges of security, stability and reliability for a sustainable energy sector using Smart Grid technologies.
The main objective of this Workshop was to facilitate the forum to discuss the various computational intelligence techniques that can be applied to Smart Grids and its applications to achieve a more efficient and environmentally friendly grid operation. The various issues, problems and challenges in terms of operation, management and control of Smart Grid have been described in details. The present scenario of power system is changing very rapidly due to the new technological developments and formulation of new regulatory polices of governments. With a wide range of leading researchers from around the country, the workshop results in a well-defined road-map for the development and deployment of Smart Grid in India.
Earlier, addressing the participants, Dr. Manoj Thakur gave emphasis on the application of various computing techniques to build a healthier and economical power grid with high penetration of renewable energy sources like small hydro energy, wind energy, solar energy etc. specially for Indian power sectors. He had also mentioned that a meaningful discussion in such august gathering would definitely lead to enrichment of all the participants and will carry the message throughout the society. This Workshop drew more than 40 participants from academic institutions and utilities from different states including UP, Haryana, MP, Delhi, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Himachal and Uttarakhand.
Several distinguish speakers from all around India discussed on the various aspects of Smart Grids. Prof. Prof S. N. Singh from IIT Kanpur; Dr. N. M. Pindoriya from IIT Gandhinagar; Prof Ramesh Oruganti, Dr. Manoj Thakur, Dr Anik Kr. Sao, Dr. Samar Agnihotri, Dr. Bharat S. Rajpurohit were among the speakers including other eminent personalities who shared their expertise with the participants. A trip to Rewalasr Lake and cultural program was arranged for the participants.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi, the youngest of all IITs and the only IIT in the Himalayas, has completely shifted B. Tech. students from its Mandi transit campus to its permanent campus at Kamand. This shifting was made possible by the inaugurations of new academic and hostel blocks earlier this week at Kamand.
On Thursday 23rd April, 2015, Prof. B.D. Chaudhary, Dean (Sponsored Research & Industrial Consultancy), IIT Mandi, inaugurated an academic building (the A5 block) at IIT Mandi's Kamand campus. He mentioned that the inauguration of a building is like celebrating a new life and that the new academic block will be associated with countless memories in the coming future. The A5 block has 4 classrooms and a conference room on ground floor, a library on first floor, and research scholar's seating and project labs on second floor. The block is to be used for teaching courses to undergraduate and graduate students. Other dignitaries gracing the occasion included: Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director; Prof. B.S. Subramanian, Dean (students), Prof. Ramesh Oruganti, Dean (academics); and, Prof. Satish Chandra Jain, Dean (I & S).
Most recently, IIT Mandi's second year B. Tech. students moved from Mandi to Kamand. Some of these students have taken accommodation in a new hostel block, G4, at Kamand. The G4 block, a part of IIT Mandi's Suvalsar hostel, was inaugurated on 25th April, 2015, by Prof. Subrata Ray, Distinguished Visiting Professor, IIT Mandi. Other dignitaries present on the occasion included: Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director; Prof. B.S. Subramanian, Dean (students), Prof. Ramesh Oruganti, Dean (academics); Dr. Varun Dutt, Chief Warden; and, Dr. Hari Verma, Warden, Suvalsar hostel. The new G4 block has 25 rooms across two floors and it is housing 75 second year B. Tech. students. This block has been constructed deploying the latest technology of using Light Gauge Steel Framing (LGSF) materials. The salient feature of this type of construction is that the rooms have excellent insulation, i.e., they remain cool during hot summers and warm during cold winters. The inauguration of the G4 block was followed by a high tea party, hosted by the Chief Warden. The high tea was attended by several students, faculty, and staff of the Institute.
The remaining boys and girls of the second year B. Tech. batch will reside in the G2 block and Chandrataal Annexe, respectively, at Kamand. The G2 block was inaugurated by Shri M. Natarajan Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi, on 15th March, 2015 evening, following IIT Mandi's 2nd convocation ceremony on the same day. With the moving of the second year B. Tech. students to Kamand, IIT Mandi is one of the first among the new IITs to completely shift its B. Tech. program to its permanent campus. The Institute will continue to use the academic building on its Mandi campus for faculty offices and project labs.
For more Information contact:
Ms. Chandan Sharma,
Public Relations Consultant (PRC)
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi
Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India
Phone: +91-1905-237987
Email: email@example.com
Mr. Mohammad Shakeel,
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi
Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India
Phone: +91-1905-267015
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Students of IIT Mandi celebrated "Hostel day" for all the hostels of Kamand (Parashar,
and Nako) on 11th April, 2015. The students organized several cultural events. Certificates of appreciation were distributed to the wardens, chief warden, hostel caretakers, and security guards. The Secretaries of various hostels were also accoladed. Prizes were distributed to the winners of various games, and the function was followed by dinner.
On Sunday 15th March, 2015, Shri M. Natarajan Chairman, BoG, IIT Mandi, inaugurated the G2 block of the Nako hostel in IIT Mandi's Kamand campus. The G2 block has 22 rooms. The G2 block has been constructed using light gauge steel frame (LGSF). The salient feature of this type of construction is that the rooms have excellent insulation, i.e., they remain cool during hot summers and warm during cold winters.
Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi; Prof. B.S. Subramanian, Dean (students); Dr. Varun Dutt, Chief Warden; and, Dr. Arnav Bhavsar, Warden, Nako Hostel were also present during the inauguration.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi, the youngest of all IITs and the only IIT in the Himalayas, celebrated its second Convocation ceremony on 15th March, 2015. The Convocation ceremony took place on IIT Mandi's permanent campus at Kamand. As part of this Convocation, 116 B. Tech. students, 8 M.S. students, and 3 Ph.D. students graduated from the Institute. Mr. Shoubhik Debnath was awarded the President's Gold Medal, Mr. Anand Dhandhania was awarded the Director's Gold Medal. Mr. Shoubhik Debnath, Mr. Krishna Karnani, and Mr. Deepak Sharma was awarded the Institute Silver Medal. Furthermore, Ms. Damini Singal was awarded the Rani Gonsalves Medal for Outstanding Female B. Tech. Student.
The Hon'ble President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee, was to be the Chief Guest of the function. However, the President was unable to reach the venue due to inclement weather. In the President's absence, the Hon'ble Shri Kalyan Singh, Governor of Himachal Pradesh was the Chief Guest. Furthermore, the Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, the Hon'ble Shri Virbhadra Singh presided. Other dignitaries included, Shri M. Natarajan, the Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi.
The ceremony began with the national anthem which set the tone of this second Convocation in the Himalayas. Shri Natarajan declared the Convocation open. The Convocation Ceremony began with the welcome speech and report by the Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his report, the Director emphasized the development of IIT Mandi in the past two years, both on academic and administrative fronts. He also mentioned the achievements of faculty and students in the recent years. The Director emphasized the unique curriculum of IIT Mandi which promotes interdisciplinarity.
Shri Virbhadra Singh congratulated IIT Mandi for its recent expansion of the academic curriculum to include Master's programs in Chemistry and Energy Materials and appreciated the initiation of an upcoming program in infrastructure and civil engineering. He encouraged IIT Mandi to undertake research in green energy and allied areas. Furthermore, the Chief Minister thanked the state's public works department for starting the work of broadening the Mandi-Kamand road.
Shri Kalyan Singh congratulated the students and wished them success in building future careers and serving the state and the nation. He praised IIT Mandi's faculty, staff, and students for their contribution in building-up IITMandi as an institute of higher technical education in Himachal Pradesh in a very short span of time. The Governor emphasised the need to serve country and humanity by bringing out the best in oneself through strong determination and high goals.
In the absence of Shri Pranab Mukherjee, Shri M. Natarajan read out the President's message. In his message, the President congratulated the IIT for its commendable accomplishments in the area of academics, infrastructure, and placements. He suggested that the nation's forward march in arts, science, and technology must overcome existing problems and challenges along the way, and this march should be spearheaded by its bright young engineers and scientists. He also encouraged the students to payback the society in the form of dividends by using their gained knowledge and skills to help those who are weak, needy, and deprived. Also, the President stressed on the valuable contribution that the IIT Mandi alumni can make through the 'Make in India' initiative.
After President's message was read, the Convocation was declared closed by Shri M. Natarajan. Prior to the speeches by dignitaries, a pledge was taken by graduating students. In the pledge, students took an oath to utilize their knowledge in the service of India in its march towards a just, inclusive, and sustainable society. After the closure of the Convocation, all the dignitaries visited the Exhibition Hall, where an exhibit showcased the research and innovation at IIT Mandi.
Throughout the programme, the sense of pride and achievement was palpable among the students, families, and the faculty and staff of the Institute. Although the Convocation happened on a day that saw rain and cloudy skies, the event ended with a ray of hope and joy that is sure to inspire the students and faculty of this Institute in the years ahead. For more Information contact:
Ms. Chandan Sharma,
Public Relations Consultant (PRC)
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi
Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India
Phone: +91-1905-237987
Email: email@example.com
Mr. Mohammad Shakeel,
Indian Institute of Technology Mandi
Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India
Phone: +91-1905-267015
Email: email@example.com
Website: www.iitmandi.ac.in
IIT Mandi's 2nd convocation page:
Pradeep Seervi, a 4th year B.Tech. (Electrical Engineering) student at IIT Mandi has successfully cracked the GATE 2015 exam securing All India Rank of 1 in Electrical Engineering.
Pradeep hails from Jodhpur, Rajasthan. Ealier, he was also awarded the DAAD scholarship and visited University of Applied Sciences, Zwickau, Germany during June-August, 2014.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi, the youngest of all IITs and the only IIT in the Himalayas, celebrated its second Convocation ceremony on 15th March, 2015. The Convocation ceremony took place on IIT Mandi's permanent campus at Kamand. As part of this Convocation, 116 B. Tech. students, 8 M.S. students, and 3 Ph.D. students graduated from the Institute. Mr. Shoubhik Debnath was awarded the President's Gold Medal, Mr. Anand Dhandhania was awarded the Director's Gold Medal. Mr. Shoubhik Debnath, Mr. Krishna Karnani, and Mr. Deepak Sharma was awarded the Institute Silver Medal. Furthermore, Ms. Damini Singal was awarded the Rani Gonsalves Medal for Outstanding Female B. Tech. Student.
The Hon'ble President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee, was to be the Chief Guest of the function. However, the President was unable to reach the venue due to inclement weather. In the President's absence, the Hon'ble Shri Kalyan Singh, Governor of Himachal Pradesh was the Chief Guest. Furthermore, the Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, the Hon'ble Shri Virbhadra Singh presided. Other dignitaries included, Shri M. Natarajan, the Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi.
The ceremony began with the national anthem which set the tone of this second Convocation in the Himalayas. Shri Natarajan declared the Convocation open. The Convocation Ceremony began with the welcome speech and report by the Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi. In his report, the Director emphasized the development of IIT Mandi in the past two years, both on academic and administrative fronts. He also mentioned the achievements of faculty and students in the recent years. The Director emphasized the unique curriculum of IIT Mandi which promotes interdisciplinarity.
Shri Virbhadra Singh congratulated IIT Mandi for its recent expansion of the academic curriculum to include Master's programs in Chemistry and Energy Materials and appreciated the initiation of an upcoming program in infrastructure and civil engineering. He encouraged IIT Mandi to undertake research in green energy and allied areas. Furthermore, the Chief Minister thanked the state's public works department for starting the work of broadening the Mandi-Kamand road.
Shri Kalyan Singh congratulated the students and wished them success in building future careers and serving the state and the nation. He praised IIT Mandi's faculty, staff, and students for their contribution in building-up IITMandi as an institute of higher technical education in Himachal Pradesh in a very short span of time. The Governor emphasised the need to serve country and humanity by bringing out the best in oneself through strong determination and high goals.
In the absence of Shri Pranab Mukherjee, Shri M. Natarajan read out the President's message. In his message, the President congratulated the IIT for its commendable accomplishments in the area of academics, infrastructure, and placements. He suggested that the nation's forward march in arts, science, and technology must overcome existing problems and challenges along the way, and this march should be spearheaded by its bright young engineers and scientists. He also encouraged the students to payback the society in the form of dividends by using their gained knowledge and skills to help those who are weak, needy, and deprived. Also, the President stressed on the valuable contribution that the IIT Mandi alumni can make through the 'Make in India' initiative.
After President's message was read, the Convocation was declared closed by Shri M. Natarajan. Prior to the speeches by dignitaries, a pledge was taken by graduating students. In the pledge, students took an oath to utilize their knowledge in the service of India in its march towards a just, inclusive, and sustainable society. After the closure of the Convocation, all the dignitaries visited the Exhibition Hall, where an exhibit showcased the research and innovation at IIT Mandi.
Throughout the programme, the sense of pride and achievement was palpable among the students, families, and the faculty and staff of the Institute. Although the Convocation happened on a day that saw rain and cloudy skies, the event ended with a ray of hope and joy that is sure to inspire the students and faculty of this Institute in the years ahead. For more Information contact: Mr. Naresh Bhandari, Indian Institute of Technology, Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India.
Phone: +91-981-601-6376; Email: email@example.com; Website: www.iitmandi.ac.in
IIT Mandi's 2nd convocation page:
IIT Mandi celebrated its 6th Foundation Day on February 24, 2015, at its permanent campus at Kamand. Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves, the first lady of IIT Mandi, was the Chief Guest for the function. On the occasion, the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves welcomed dignitaries, faculty, staff, and students. The dignitaries included, Prof. Subrata Ray, Distinguished Visiting Professor; Prof. Ramesh Oruganti, Dean (Academics); Prof. Lalit Malhotra, Dean (Finance and Accounts); and, Mr. Mohammad Shakeel, Registrar, IIT Mandi.
Six years ago, IIT Mandi's foundation stone was laid on the very same day at Kamand to mark the beginning of this Institute. Now, the Institute has a large number of its students and faculty residing at the Kamand campus. With academic, research, cultural activities happening on its permanent campus on a regular basis, the Institute is already proving to be a single destination for excellence, innovation, and learning in the Himalayas. The day was commemorated with various sports events, cultural activities, and an award ceremony for students, faculty, and staff of IIT Mandi.
The sports events included games like the volleyball, tug-of-war, and cross-country race with participation from faculty, staff, and students. The volleyball game was won by a team of 3rd year and 4th year B. Tech. students. The tug-of-war for men was won by the 4th year B. Tech. students. Also, the tug-of-war for women was won by the girl's student team.
The sports activity was followed by lighting of the lamp and honouring dignitaries. The lamp lightning was followed by Director's address. In his address, the Director highlighted the role a foundation plays in building of an institute. He mentioned that a strong foundation helps in the overall development of the academic edifice and helps in incorporating changes which come about in the future. Using the analogy of the construction of the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, he explained that the quality of the academic foundation needs to be measured. He mentioned that there are several ways of measuring academic quality and some of these ways include, publications, student exchange, placements, faculty interaction with industry, and ability to get funds from abroad. He said that before we construct the next floor, we also need to stop, take stock, and plan for changes.
The Director's address was followed by an address by the Chief Guest, Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves. In her address, the Chief Guest reminded the audience of the beginning years when there was no IIT Mandi at Kamand and the area was in darkness; and, now, after 6 years, the Kamand valley sparkled like a jewel. Also, she recounted the fact that there were a number of hardships related to living at Kamand; however, the students, staff, and faculty had adapted to their surroundings courageously. She also thanked the Kamand residents for welcoming the IIT Mandi community to their neighborhood.
The Chief Guest's address was followed by a cultural programme. In the cultural programme, children of IIT Mandi's Kamand and Mandi day cares and Takshila School put up entertaining dance performances and a skit on saving tigers and caring for our plants, trees, and forests. Other items included a classical dance performance by Sonali Malhotra, IIT Mandi, and a mix of Western and Indian style dance performance by first-year B. Tech. students.
The day also saw distribution of awards to the students, staff, and faculty for their achievements and excellence in their work at IIT Mandi. The day got to a close with a vote of thanks by the Registrar and marked the start of a new semester in the New Year at IIT Mandi.
For more Information contact:
Mr. Naresh Bhandari, Indian Institute of Technology, Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India Phone: +91-1905-267059; Mobile: 98160-16376; Email: email@example.com; Website: www.iitmandi.ac.in
The Medicinal Plant Laboratory of IIT Mandi has developed a health drink Ambrosia-de-Uhl, the nectar of Uhl valley, for use by IIT Mandi residents. It was released on 26th of January, 2015 by the Director of the Institute Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves in the presence of students, faculty and staff of the Institute. Speaking on the occasion, Prof Gonsalves highly appreciated the efforts made by the project team to develop the unique health drink. He stressed the need to use modern technological tools to strengthen the beneficial effects of the developed drink. Ambrosia-de-Uhl contains herbs like Basil, Cinnamomum, Rose petals, Lemon grass and Mentha grown organically in the Institute's First Aid Medicinal Plant Garden. As per the Indian System of Medicine, these herbs are believed to have anti-stress, cardioprotective and immunomodulatory properties. It can be used as a hot refreshing drink, traditional tea or black tea, as a mood elevator and prophylactic agent against different ailments. It is available for sale at the lab, in the Bamboo Block-D ( adjacent to GCS/Book Nook).
IIT Mandi won the gold medal in the "Data Analytics" event in the 3rd Inter-IIT Tech Meet, held at IIT Kharagpur between 30th January and 1st February, 2015. This medal was tied with IIT Kharagpur. IIT Mandi also won silver medals in the events "Hardware Modeling" and "Tech-Biz Quiz". Also, IIT Mandi put up a good competition in the other events as well. With this, IIT Mandi obtained the 3rd place in the overall General Championship Tally. Winning teams are given below.
AIIT Mandi proudly celebrated the 66th Republic Day with patriotic fervour and traditional gaiety in front of the A1 Block at its permanent campus at Kamand. On the occasion, Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, hoisted the National Tricolour and took salute by the security personnel in the presence of faculty, officers, staff and students. The event left everyone with the strong determination to excel in their respective fields for the welfare of the nation.
Aditya Chauhan received the Young Scientist Award (2014-2015) in the Materials Science category in the 102nd Indian Science Congress. The award consists of Rs 25,000 and a Certificate of Merit. An MS student, Aditya is working in the area of materials selection, energy harvesting and solid state refrigeration using piezoelectric ceramics under the guidance of Dr. Rahul Vaish. He has for the first time experimentally demonstrated giant refrigeration effect in piezoelectric ceramics. He has published over twenty research articles in peer reviewed international journals, gaining over 160 citations in just 2 years. The Science Congress was hosted by the University of Mumbai.
Dr. Arti Kashyap is awarded the prestigious Simons Associate of The Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics at Trieste, Italy (ICTP, http://www.ictp.it/) from January 1, 2015 till Dec 31, 2020. The award supports multiple visits to ICTP during the award period. Since inception, in 1964, ICTP is Center of Excellence and an instrument to promote physics in developing countries. Associates are appointed to take initiatives in their country. Simons Associate are supported by the grant from Simons Foundation.
A two day Workshop on 'Smart Micro-Grids for Autonomous Zero-Net Energy Buildings' organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) during Dec. 14-15, 2014.
The Workshop was inaugurated by Prof. B. D. Chaudhary, Dean SRIC IIT Mandi. In his inaugural address Prof. Chaudhary highlighted the accomplishment and research activities of IIT Mandi. While sharing the vision of IIT Mandi, as an Institute 'to be a leader in science and technology education, knowledge creation and innovation, in an India marching towards a just, inclusive and sustainable society' and one of its thrust area 'to devise globally recognized solutions for the problems of society and industry, particularly in the fragile eco-system of the Himalayas', he emphasized the relevance of this timely Workshop by which different groups of society can come together to solve the challenges of security, stability and reliability for a sustainable energy sector and extended rural electrification.
The main objective of this Workshop was to facilitate the forum to discuss the Smart Micro-Grids for Autonomous Zero-Net Energy Buildings and its suitable applications for efficient power grid operation in smart grid environment. The various issues, problems and challenges of the micro-grids operation, management and control have been described with high renewable energy. The power systems is changing very rapidly due to the new technological developments and formulation of new regulatory polices of governments. As the leading researchers from the country are invited, the workshop results in a well-defined road-map for the development and deployment of Smart Grid in India.
Earlier, addressing the participants, Workshop coordinators Dr. B. S. Rajpurohit gave emphasis on developing the technological and regulatory solutions to build a healthier and economical power grid with high penetration of renewable energy sources like small hydro energy, wind energy, solar energy etc. specially for Indian power sectors. Workshop coordinator said that meaningful discussion in such august gathering would definitely lead to enrichment of all the participants and will carry the message throughout the society. This Workshop has drew more than 35 participants from academic institutions, and utilities from different states including UP, Punjab, Haryana, MP, Delhi, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Odisha, Himachal and Uttarakhand.
Several distinguish speakers from all around the India discussed several aspects of Micro-Grids. Prof. Francisco Gonzalez Longatt, Loughborough University, UK, Prof S. N. Singh from IIT Kanpur, Dr. N. M. Pindoriya from IIT Gandhinagar, Dr. Rohit Bhakar, University of Bath, UK were among the speakers including other eminent personalities who shared their expertise with the participants. A trip to Rewalasr Lake and cultural program was arranged for the participants. The Workshop was financially supported by Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, Delhi, DST-UKIERI and IIT Mandi.
Girls' Table Tennis Team won the first medal (bronze) for IIT Mandi in the 50th Inter-IIT Students' Sports Meet 2014 held at IIT Bombay during December 12-19. They beat IIT Madras for the third position.
Badminton girls' team and Cricket boys' team also played quarterfinals. This is the first time for IIT Mandi to win a bronze medal as well as enter quarterfinals for the other two events.
In the 22nd Inter-IIT Staff Meet, IIT Mandi maintained its high standard in cricket and won a bronze medal after beating IIT Roorkee for the third position.
Title: IIT Mandi research paper gets "Honorable mention" in IEEE ANTS,
2014, an International Conference on Advanced Networks and
Telecommunication Systems.
Details: The research paper titled "Enhanced Optical Power Budget in DDO-OFDM-PON and CO-OFDM-PON System Using Frequency Diversity" has been awarded "Honorable Mention" in the best poster category in the IEEE ANTS 2014 conference, held from14th -17th December, 2014 at New Delhi. The paper is co-authored by Pravindra Kumar (Ph.D. student, IIT Mandi) and Prof. Anand Srivastava (former faculty, IIT Mandi). The paper deals with a novel technique to improve the optical power budget in next generation optical access systems.
IIT Mandi witnessed 'YUVYOM'14', the first youth festival organized by the Cultural Society during 14-16th Nov'14. Multiple events were scheduled over the weekend and the festival witnessed a huge participation. The students enjoyed an open-air movie screening of "Rang De Basanti" in front of a bonfire. The movie screening was followed by LAN Gaming.
Day two began with kabaddi, followed by kite flying, face painting competition and a musical evening with YouTube artists. This was followed by the most awaited Halloween Party. For this, the Art Geeks Club decorated the hall with ghosts, goblins and carved pumpkins. Participants wore masks and some were disguised with painted faces.
Day three began with carnival games, followed by a quiz. Thereafter followed the cultural night, in which Music and Choreo Section students presented their performances. This was followed by DJ night which got everyone's feet moving.
From 7-9th Nov'14, IIT Mandi witnessed 'Utkarsh'14', the first Intra-college technical festival organized by the Science & Technology Council (SnTC). Different events were organized over the weekend and all students took part actively. The day one started with the event Electrolyte by the Electronics Club in the Mandi Campus where students designed logic circuits for generating various patterns using LEDs. Day two witnessed many events like the signature Junkyard Wars, Stick-o-bridge, Robo-Rumble and other events organized by various clubs of the SnTC. Apart from these events a workshop was organized by the Programming Club in collaboration with Mozilla where experts from Mozilla trained the students on various Mozilla apps and products. The festival ended with a prize distribution hosting eminent chief guests Gautam Mahajan, Dr. Vinay Kumar along with the Dean of Students Prof. B. Subramanian.
Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi visited Germany during 4-5th November 2014 to attend the 3rd Young Investigators meeting (YIM) at Hanover and to promote the collaboration between IIT Mandi and the TU9 Universities. A large number of Ph.D. scholars and postdocs of Indian origin attended the YIM that was organized by the Indian embassy in Berlin. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Erich Barke, President, Leibniz Universität Hanover inaugurated the meeting. Representatives from various IITs informed the young researchers about the opportunities available in India while there was opportunity for the youngsters to showcase their research. Professor Dr. iur. Volker Epping, Presidential designate, LUH also attended a round table meeting that was held in the office of the President, LUH.
The growing applications of mathematics in biology have attracted many researchers across the globe in the recent times. To analyse the real-time data and draw concrete conclusions to help health agencies and other government bodies to plan different policies for the prevention of diseases is a very challenging task.
To have a rigorous understanding of methods and application in biology, Mathematics faculty of IIT Mandi have organised a three days lecture program on mathematical modeling and data analysis in biology (funded by SERB) from 27th Oct to 29th Oct 2014 under National Network for Mathematical & Computational Biology (NNMCB).
The lecture program was attended by total 57 bright and motivated students pursuing science, and engineering courses at the under-graduate, postgraduate and Ph.D levels. These participants are from H.P., J&K, Punjab and nearby states. One of the main objectives of the program was to promote research in small towns in these states.
The lecture program was inaugurated by honourable Director of IIT Mandi Prof T. A. Gonsalves . In his inaugural speech Prof. Gonsalves threw light on systematic development of biology and computational biology. The program was graced by speakers like Prof. Somdatta Sinha (IISER, Mohali), Prof. Sitabhra Sinha (IMSc Chennai), Dr. Malay Banarjee (IIT Kanpur), Prof. Govindan Rangrajan (IISc Banglore), Prof. D. C. Gautam (HPU Shimla), Dr. Vikram Singh (CUHP Dharamshala), Dr. Ashis K. Mitra (NCMRWF Delhi) , Dr. Syed Abbas (IIT Mandi), Dr. Rajendra Ray (IIT Mandi), Dr. Manoj Thakur (IIT Mandi), Dr. Mulim Malik (IIT Mandi) and Dr. Sarita Azad (IIT Mandi).
The program covered wide range of topics like modeling of data in biology, biological networks and applications, introduction to differential equations, ODE models in mathematical ecology: analytical findings, impact of recent biotechnological developments: human cloning, numerical methods: an application to blood flow, Granger causality with applications to neuroscience, applications in data mining, introduction to data mining and data analysis with applications, numerical modeling and forecasting of monsoons.
"Every now and then one paints a picture that seems to have opened a door and serves as a stepping stone to other things." With this spirit in mind, the NSS unit collaborated with the IEEE Power and Energy Society (PES) to organize a lab visit and painting competition on theme Energy Saving and Innovations in the Usage of Renewable Energy for the school students of Government Sen. Sec. School Kotli on 18th October, 2014.
The school students visited the IIT Mandi Campuses at Mandi and Kamand. At Mandi, the NSS staff with volunteers welcomed the school staff and students. NSS volunteers organized an interaction session for the school students. The session include some interesting topics on academics and about admissions at IIT's. Volunteers took them to different labs like physics lab, computer lab, electrical lab, electronics lab and mechanical lab at IIT campus Mandi. In the physics lab, some experiments were performed. An introduction on IT/multimedia was also given by the volunteers.
At Kamand campus, students has visited Advanced Materials Research Center (AMRC), where they came to know about the research going on at IIT Mandi. The working of some of the instruments were also explained. The school students were very enthusiastic to know more and more about different activities undertaken at IIT Mandi.
A design and painting competition for school students and NSS volunteers were organized by IEEE PES society. Around 60 students participated in painting competition. Mrs. Priscilla Gonsalves and Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi judged the painting competition and appreciated the efforts of the participants. Prof. Gonsalves gave emphasis on the importance of IIT Mandi in the Himalayan religion and distributed mementos/certificates to winners and participants. Prof. Anand Srivastava judged the paintings of NSS volunteers and appreciated their efforts in organizing the outreach activity.
Civil constructions namely roads, buildings, bridges and tunnels etc in hilly region have always remained a challenge for the civil engineers. The civil engineering educations are to be imparted and researches are to be carried out for safe and customised solutions meeting all the socio-economic, climate and engineering requirements (geotechnical , structural and material, energy, water management etc ) of the region.
Aiming these goals, the workshop on civil engineering was organised on 7th and 8th October 2014, at IIT Mandi. This workshop was in a sequel of the first brainstorming workshop on civil engineering held on 19th April 2014 in which experts broadly identified the issues related to hilly region.
Prof. V S Raju, Former Director of IIT Delhi was chairman of the workshop. The workshop was attended by Prof. Balhasar Novak , an esteemed professor and structural engineer of university of Stuttgart, Germany and Mr. Thomas Mutscler, a renowned geo-technologist from Germany and experts from IIT Madras and Gauhati and Mandi. After two days deliberations, the experts finalized the teaching and evaluation scheme for B. Tech ( Civil engineering )maintaining the general character of civil engineering education and simultaneously ,giving the opportunity for students to tackle realistic problems of Himalayan region. Research areas and corresponding laboratory requirements were also identified for holistic and sustainable developments of Himalayan region.
The Board of Academics (BOA) of IIT Mandi has been constituted, to consider proposals on policy matters related to Academics, both teaching and research. Proposals that are found to have merit will be forwarded to the Senate with the BoA's recommendations. The first meeting of the BOA was held on 19th September 2014. The BoA is chaired by the Dean (Academics), and its members include the associate deans, Chairman of the course proposal committee, course coordinators, nominees from each school, and two student members. The BoA meets once a month.
Hailing from Paikatand, Jharkhand, Dr. Lakshman Mahto has the distinction of being the first person to complete a PhD entirely in IIT Mandi! He joined IIT Mandi in the first batch of PhD students on 20th October, 2010 and worked under the guidance of Dr. Syed Abbas. Lakshman Mahto is the first PhD student guided by Dr. Syed Abbas after he joined IIT Mandi as a fresh Assistant Professor in 2010.
On September 24th, 2014 he presented his thesis to the Director, IIT Mandi, who handed over his provisional degree certificate. During his PhD thesis defense on 15th September, 2014, the external examiner commended the high quality of his research. He will receive the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the 2nd Convocation of the Institute, to be held in November 2014.
Dr. Mahto's research interests are in the mathematical theory and numerical analysis of fractional partial differential equations (PDE) with impulsive effects. His thesis "Analysis of Impulsive Fractional Functional Differential Equations" considers applications of fractional PDEs to Population Dynamics, Control Theory and Neural Networks.
Dr. Mahto plans to go to a leading research university in Europe or North America for a postdoc. This will equip him for a career as a faculty in one of India's top research universities -- which we hope will be his alma mater in the Himalayas!
IIT MANDI and TU9, Germany organized collaborative workshop on "Emerging Semiconductor Technologies" IECRAIETS – 2014 at IIT MANDI, Kamand Campus on September 26-27th, 2014. The objective of this collaborative confluence was to involve experts from semiconductor fields, especially micro/nano electronics, VLSI technology and explore possible future collaborations.Click here for more details
The honorable President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee hosted a one day conference with the Chairmen, Board of Governors and Directors of the Indian Institutes of Technology at Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi on August 22, 2014. The Prime Minister and the Union Minister of Human Resource Development also addressed the gathering. Prof T.A. Gonsalves, Director of IIT Mandi, highlighted the strategy adopted by IIT Mandi on its path to prominence as a research university. This includes focusing on a few areas of regional and national relevance, like material science, and information and communication technology (ICT.) Projects of social relevance, including technologies for the Himalayan region (through the Uhl Centre for Innovative Technologies for the Himalayan Region, IIT Mandi) were described. The curriculum embraced by IIT Mandi, which emphasises on learning-by-doing, teamwork and social relevance were also touched upon. The Director also outlined plans for the new campus at Kamand.
Mr. Dhirendra Kumar Singh, a student of 2010 BTech (EE) batch, set up a startup company "IITians Technology" in Shimla, which was inaugurated by Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi on 1st August, 2014. The company, started along with his friend Avnish Kumar, provides training in electronics and communications to engineering college students. IITians Tech also plans to take up R&D projects using student interns. See www.iitianstech.com for more about the company. Everyone here at IIT Mandi joins the Director, Prof. Gonsalves in wishing Dhirendra much success in his venture.
IIT Mandi is organizing an extensive orientation program for its first years from 3rd – 9th August. It is compulsory for all first year students to be present and participate in the week long program.
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi organized a Vice Chancellors Interaction Conclave on Friday, 20th June, 2014 at its permanent campus in Kamand. The objective of this conclave was to foster cooperation and collaboration among educational institutions in Himachal Pradesh (HP) and Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). The conclave involved Vice Chancellors (VCs) and Directors of several science and technology universities and institutes in HP and J&K. The Chief Guest on the occasion was Mr. Ashok Thakur, Secretary Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, kicked-off the event with a welcome address to the attendees. In his address, Prof. Gonsalves urged the participating institutions to work together to foster and lead collaborations and cooperation in order to overcome the limitations of their remote location. He emphasized the opportunity for the local institutions to make an impact by attending to regional problems of HP and J&K states. Prof. Gonsalves' address was reciprocated by an address by Mr. Ashok Thakur. Mr. Thakur, in his address, stressed the need for an institution geared towards "Himalayan technologies," whereby regional challenges could be addressed in meaningful ways. He mentioned about the accreditation of science and technology institutions in India that would help them achieve higher visibility and rankings in the world. Mr. Ashok Thakur also emphasized the role of National Knowledge Network (NKN) and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) that could help make science and technology education accessible to many; and, the need to develop technical skills among students. Mr. Thakur's address was followed by presentations from different schools at IIT Mandi, where each school showcased its current strengths and potential. A presentation was made on the Advanced Material Research Centre, IIT Mandi, and this presentation showcased a number of material-science research facilities that existed at IIT Mandi like the synthesis lab, Powder X-ray Diffractometer, and High Resolution Transmission Electron Microscope.
The later part of the day saw a number of panel discussions on different themes that included: Sciences & Technology (S&T) education in the region; needs of the region in S&T; and, fostering linkages to strengthen S&T education in the region. Under the S&T education theme, the first panel discussed the current trends in engineering and science education, and it was moderated by Prof. B. D. Chaudhary, Visiting Professor, IIT Mandi. The panel highlighted the need to maintain quality of engineering and science education and the need to enrich and motivate students in the classroom. The panelists mentioned that resources like equipment, library, web-sources, and databases should be shared among institutions in the HP and J&K states. A second panel discussion under the S&T education theme was moderated by Prof. R. L. Sharma, Vice Chancellor, Himachal Pradesh Technical University, Hamirpur. This panel stressed on the mechanisms for collaboration among institutions in the region. The panel brought forth an idea to setup an "edu-cloud" that could serve the educational needs of all participating institutions. The panelists emphasized the need for inter-university collaborative projects, joint-research proposals, and private-public partnerships. The discussion also touched upon the need for faculty development through "training the trainer" programmes in the HP and J&K states.
Furthermore, under the fostering linkages to strengthen S&T theme, a panel discussion took place on developing mechanisms for collaboration in both research and teaching between institutions of HP and J&K states. This panel was moderated by Prof. P. K. Khosla, Vice Chancellor, Shoolini University and it emphasized collaboration to be the critical need of the hour, where all concerned parties benefit equally. The discussion highlighted the importance of faculty and student exchange programmes, creating better pool of resources, and utilizing generated revenues in an efficient manner. It was discussed that IIT Mandi had already taken the first step of setting-up of a programme whereby faculty applicants from HP and J&K could enroll into a part-time M.S. and Ph.D. at the Institute. Similarly, it was discussed that IIT Mandi had also started collaborating with the Central University of Himachal Pradesh, Dharamsala, on course exchanges, where 1 to 2 courses at an institution would be opened for students of the other institution.
The event drew to a close with a round table discussion on the future courses of action, moderated by Mr. Thakur. A direct outcome of this discussion was the decision taken by all participants to create a consortium of private and public institutions in HP and J&K. The conclave ended with a vote of thanks from IIT Mandi to all participating institutions. The conclave was attended by a large number of institutions from HP and J&K represented by their VCs or Directors. The participants included: IIT Mandi; Kashmir University, Srinagar; ICFAI Group Universities, Baddi; APG University, Shimla; NIT, Hamirpur; Islamic University of Science and Technology, Pulwana; Indian Education Centre University, Baddi; Indus International University, Una; Eternal University, Baru Sahib; Himachal Pradesh Technical University, Hamirpur; Jaypee University of Information Technology, Wakna Ghat; Baba Ghulam Shah Badshah University, Jammu; Sri Sai University, Palampur; Mahraja Agrasen University, Solan; Shoolini University, Solan; Central University of Kashmir, Srinagar; Career Point University, Hamirpur; Baddi University of Emerging Sciences & Technology, Baddi; and, Central University of Jammu, Jammu.
Yet another milestone in the development of IIT-Mandi, the IIT Mandi-Takshila Primary School was inaugurated on 21st May 2014. The chief guest of the event, Mrs. Priscilla Gonsalves opened the school in presence of the Director, Deans, Registrar, members of the faculty and staff, first batch of students, and their parents. The school is run by Takshila Education Society Mandi, headed by Ms. Shailja Kashyap. The first batch will have seven students spread across Pre-Nursery, Nursery, Kindergarten, Class 1 and Class 3 sections with three teachers and one caregiver......
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) organized the second Industry - Academia Interaction Conclave on Friday, 23rd May 2014 at its permanent campus in Kamand. The objective of the current conclave was to showcase the strengths of IIT Mandi to partner with the industry, to understand the problems being faced by industry and society at large, and to explore possible solutions to such problems. The Chief Guest on the occasion was Er. Kartar Singh, Founder and CEO, Amber Group of Industries.....
On 18th May 2014, Institute witnessed the second edition of Aavishkar, Intra-college technical festival. Events were scheduled throughout the day starting with the Aavishkar Open-House, which was held in the newly inaugurated Lounge in Kamand. In the Open-House, all the clubs under Science & Technology Council (SNTC) displayed their projects. The clubs that displayed projects were Electronics Club, Astronomy Club, Robotics Section, Mobile Application Development (MAD) Club, Energy Club and Programming Club.
On Sunday 18th May, 2014, Director, Timothy A. Gonsalves inaugurated "The Lounge" in Kamand Mess premises. The initiative of building a new hub for cultural and technical activities was initiated collectively by Student Gymkhana, motivated by the Dean Students, Prof. B.S. Subramanian.
Dr. Varun Dutt, Assistant Professor, SCEE, SHSS, IIT Mandi, has recently been nominated as the Vice-Chair of the IEEE Computer Society Chapter India Council (Conference/Workshop Committee).
NSS unit IIT Mandi has taken a vital step by starting a 'literacy programme' for the children of migrant laborers working in the campus of IIT Kamand, Mandi on April 29th, 2014. This programme was inaugurated by Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves in the presence of NSS team and faculty members. Books, notebooks, stationary, cloths and footwear were distributed to those children.
As a sequel to our first Industry-Academia Interaction Conclave held on May 5, 2012, the 2nd Industry-Academia Interaction Conclave is going to be held on May 23, 2014. The event is jointly organized by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Indian Institute of Technology Mandi at the Kamand Campus (Mandi, Himachal Pradesh).
Institute Colloquia started approximately at the same time as IIT Mandi started functioning from its transit campus at Mandi and we had many eminent people as our speakers such as Prof. J. V. Narlikar, Prof. R. Gadagkar, and Prof. S. Ramaswami. This time our speaker was Prof. S. P. Mahulikar from School of Engineering of IIT Mandi.
IIT Mandi launched the team walking program last month to encourage all members of the IIT community to exercise daily to improve fitness. Any member of the IIT community can join a walking team with four friends, colleagues or acquaintances. For our first walk we had one hundred participants including students, professors, engineers, nurses, office assistants, administrators, wives of faculty and staff, research scholars, and parents.
Exodia'14 was the third edition of the annual technical-cultural festival Exodia organized by the students of IIT Mandi. The 3 day event took place between 11-13 April with an aim of promoting technical and cultural talent and providing an incubation nest for the same.
Exodia invites you to the guest lecture by Mr. Gautam Mahajan, inventor of Pet Bottles and Noise Control Kits, Sunday Morning 10:00 hrs. in NKN Room A-1 Block, IIT-Mandi. Mr. Gautam Mahajan, President of Customer Value Foundation is the leading global thought leader in Total Customer Value Management. Mr Mahajan worked for a Fortune 50 company in the USA for 17 years and had hand-on experience in consulting, training of leaders, professionals, managers and CEOs from numerous MNCs and local conglomerates like Tata, Birla and Godrej groups.
Exodia, despite being a nascent techno-cultural festival has left an indelible mark on the college scene. All set to streamroll into its third year, Exodia has carved out for itself a niche space, establishing itself as the biggest college fest of Himalayas and an exclusive brand building gateway in the region.
AAGAZ is the annual inter year sports tournament held every year in the spring semester to encourage the spirit of sports among the students of IIT Mandi. AAGAZ '14 was successfully organized this year by the dedicated work of the students in general and the sports secretary of the college, Mohit Rawat, in particular along with the support of the coaches and PTI.
Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi and Dr. Tulika Srivastava, School of Basic Sciences visited RWTH Aachen, Germany on 27th to 29th March, 2014 . The visit was intended to spur academic collaboration under the MoU between IIT Mandi and the TU9 (the 9 leading technology universities of Germany).
The First Indoor Badminton court was inaugurated on 4th April, 2014 by Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi in the Kamand Campus. A friendly badminton match was played between the Director, faculty members and students. This was followed by a girls students match, 1st year v/s 3rd year as part of the AAGAZ intramural meet. The badminton hall has two courts and is floodlit. It will allow students and campus residents to play badminton around the clock in all weather.
WCC IIT Mandi organized its first (Mini) workshop on Saturday, the 15th of March 2014. The program was initiated under the leadership of Dr. Arti Kashyap, Chairperson-WCC, IIT Mandi, with a motive of bringing about sensitization on gender ethics at workplace. The event comprised two sections: first 'an invited talk by guest speaker' and second 'a panel discussion' spaced by 'Director's Speech on the occasion'.
Dr. Satinder Kumar Sharma, Assistant Professor, School of Computing and Electrical Engineering, IIT-Mandi, was awarded the best poster prize for the poster entitled "Novel Non-Chemical Amplified (n-CARs) Resists for Next Generation Lithography (NGL) Applications" sponsored by the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), Cambridge, U.K. The poster session took place at the International Conference on Nano Science and Technology, (ICONSAT), INST, 2014, Chandigarh, March 3-5, 2014. This award consists of a citation, token cash prize and a rare publication of Prof. C.N. Rao research collection. The research presented at the poster session was made possible through research collaboration with the Intel research team of post-doctoral fellows, Dr. Vikram Singh (Material Science), Dr. V. S. V. Satynarayana (Organic Chemistry), Dr.Vishwanath Kalyani (Inorganic Chemistry) and faculty at IIT Mandi, Dr. Subrata Ghosh and Dr. Pradeep Parameswaran (Co-PIs). Prof. Kenneth Gonsalves (PI) provided the vision and guidance for the project.
The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Chapter at IIT Mandi recently organised a Distinguished Speaker Program (DSP) on Monday, March 3, 2014. The speaker was Prof. Hanan Samet from Computer Science Department, University of Maryland, College Park.
Prof. Samet is a distinguished researcher in the fields of data structures, computer graphics, geographic information systems, computer vision, robotics, database management systems and programming languages. He received the B.S. degree in engineering from UCLA, and the M.S. Degree in operations research and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science from Stanford University. At Stanford, he was a member of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab where he was one of the developers of the SAIL programming language compiler.
Women Center Committee, is organizing a mini-workshop on March 15, 2014, Saturday, as per the following programme:
Interactive talk of Dr Sharmila Sreekumar, IIT Bombay on "Caution: Wo-Men at work--Volatile Genders Inside" at 10:00 am. Panel Discussion on "Why men should care" at 11:30am.
Abstract of the talk
We live in and through gender. So much so that we take it for granted. Furthermore, we often do not "see" it. This presentation seeks to examine our commonsense about gender and open our sights to the manyinsidious, extensive and paradoxical ways in which gender operates. It also seeks to pose new and discomfiting questions about gender.
IIT Mandi celebrated its 5th Foundation Day on February 24, 2014, at its permanent campus at Kamand, a township located 18 kilometres from the main Mandi town. On the occasion, the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves welcomed the Chief Guest, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Wolfram Ressel, Rector, Technical University (TU), Stuttgart, Germany; the Guest of Honour, Shri. Dinesh Kumar Jain, Former-Ambassador, Government of India; and., Dr. Wolfgang Holtkamp, Senior Advisor, International Affairs, TU, Stuttgart, Germany..
Five years ago, IIT Mandi's foundation stone was laid on the same very day to mark the beginning of this Institute as a single destination for excellence, innovation, and learning in the Himalayas. The day was commemorated with various sports events, cultural activities, and an award ceremony for students, faculty, and staff of IIT Mandi. The sports events included games like the volleyball and tug-of-war between teams consisting of faculty and staff, and students. The volleyball game was won by a team of 3rd year and 4th year B. Tech. students. The tug-of-war for men was won by 1st and 2nd year B. Tech. students. Also, the tug-of-war for women was won by the girl's student team.
Prof. Shripad P. Mahulikar is on long-term deputation from IIT-Bombay (Aerospace Dept.) to School of Engineering IIT Mandi. His research interests are in the broad fields of Thermodynamics & Heat Transfer. His areas of specialization include Infrared Signatures, Thermodynamics of Self-Organization, and Micro-Convective Heat Transfer. His classroom teaching interests include Aircraft Stealth Technology and Aircraft Propulsion. He was recently interviewed for a press-release in Times of Shimla, the 'Times of India' supplement in Himachal, dt. 28.Dec'2013.
On 29th December, 2013 IIT Mandi's faculty-staff cricket team won the Gold Medal after defeating IIT Delhi, IIT Roorkee and IIT Kanpur in the 21st Inter-IIT Staff Sports meet held at IIT Guwahati, the first Gold Medal ever by a New IIT. IIT Mandi was ranked 5th in the overall point table (Men) followed by IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi, IIT Bombay and IIT Roorkee. The victory is truly remarkable and IIT Mandi is prepared to continue to make a substantial contribution to the future of such events.
Dr. Rahul Vaish, Assistant Professor and Chairperson, School of Engineering, at IIT Mandi has been honoured with The Council of the Indian Ceramic Society's Dr. R L Thakur Memorial Award - 2013 on December 19, 2013 at their 77th Annual Session, held at S.N.T.I. Auditorium, Bistupur, Jamshedpur. He shares this award with Dr. Amartya Mukhopadhyay, IIT Bombay. Given for his valuable contributions in the field of Material Science and Engineering, the award consists of a Silver Plaque of Honor and a Citation.
It is widely believed that the next industrial revolution is likely to be spurred by nanotechnology and biotechnology. Nanobiotechnology is a subject at the interface of the two. Nanobiotechnology promises remarkably new ways of diagnosis and treatment of diseases. A society for nanobiotechnology was formed during a national symposium that was organized at IIT Mandi last year. The society was registered and has been formally inaugurated by Dr. Priscilla Gonsalves during the 2nd national symposium on nanobiotechnology at IIT Mandi, Kamand campus on 9th December.
Leading experts from across the country presented their research work on various aspects of nanobiotechnology including policy issues, advances in bioimaging, nanomedicine and biomimetics. "It is highly fascinating to know how the tools of nanotechnology can be used for identifying emerging plagues" said Dr. Atanu Basu, from National Institute of Virology, Pune. A panel discussion was also held to decide on future course of action for the society. Dr. Kotnala, President of the society announced that the society will strive to promote applications of nanobiotechnology in agriculture and health research keeping in view of the challenges and opportunities before the nation.
The symposium will be followed by a workshop on transmission electron microscopy where intensive training will be given to selected participants to prepare samples, to do imaging and analysis using the advanced high resolution cryo-electron microscopy facility at IIT Mandi. TEM imaging is more of an art and there is a huge gap in the demand for trained manpower across the world in this area. "IIT Mandi is planning to organize such training events and develop advanced courses in electron microscopy to bridge the gap" said Dr. Prem Siril, Dr. Subrata Ghosh and Dr. Chayan Nandi, organisers of the workshop.
An exhibition of instruments by various instrument manufacturers was also held on the sidelines of the symposium.
School of Computing and Electrical Engineering (SCEE) at IIT Mandi has received recommendation on a five-year project from Department of Science & Technology, Fund for Improvement of S&T, (DST-FIST) to strengthen the teaching and research facilities in the School. Considering the status of the S&T in the universities and related academic institutions which are in dire need of funding to strengthening the existing S&T infrastructure support with adequate funding and associated flexibility, Government of India in the year 2000 had announced a major new initiative titled "Fund for Improvement of S&T infrastructure in universities & higher educational institutions (FIST)". For more information on DST-FIST. See http://www.fist-dst.org/index.asp.
The recommended research facility with maximum allowed budget are Real-time digital simulator (200 Lacs) and Wind turbine with HIL Simulator (35 Lacs). Real-time digital simulator is one of the important elements of a modern state-of-the-art electrical engineering laboratory which is expected to facilitate, teaching and research on
IIT Mandi envisions to set-up a Real Time Simulation lab facility that is easily scalable, affordable and easy to maintain by local teams and that keeps pace with the evolution of computer technologies. Apart from Power System Applications, this simulator is also expected to facilitate real-time simulation of Hybrid vehicle Engine, Fuel cell based micro grids, Gasoline Engine, Hybrid Drive train Simulations etc. Additionally, the Real Time Simulation labs can be expanded to address more complex power system network simulation in real time. It will also communicate with the smart constant power appliances, smart meters, and embedded controls on the power converters provided with the hybrid renewable sources. The communication needs to be two-way to facilitate data acquisition and control command transfer to the device level controls.
Renewable Energy sources like wind and solar power have become global research topics. Driven by dual objectives of reducing both greenhouse emissions and dependence on fossil resources, a number of privately and publicly funded research projects are ongoing at research centers and universities across India. SCEE, IIT Mandi is interested in establishing an experimental set-up for widely installed configuration of wind turbines i.e. Doubly-fed Induction Generator (DFIG) with bi-directional power electronics converters and real-time controller.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi, the youngest of all IITs and the only IIT in the Himalayas, celebrated its first convocation ceremony on 20th October, 2013. As part of this convocation, 94 B. Tech. students, 2 M.S. students, and 1 Ph.D. student graduated from the Institute. Mr. Subodh Bhargava, Chairman, Tata Communications Ltd., was the chief guest on the occasion. In addition, the Guests of Honour included, Mr. M. Natarajan, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi, and Prof. V. S. Raju, Chairman, Naval Research Board, Government of India.
As part of the graduating students, Mr. Shejin T. received the first M.S. degree from IIT Mandi for his thesis titled "Significance of Dictionary for Sparse Coding based Face Recognition." This thesis analysed the use of a novel WD Face dictionary on various aspects of sparse-coding based face recognition. A second M.S. degree recipient from IIT Mandi was Mr. Ranjit Singh for his thesis titled, "Modeling and Performance Analysis of Three Phase Grid Connected Solar Photovoltaic System." Ranjit worked for his thesis to propose several efficient and intelligent maximum power point tracking algorithms for a grid connected SPV system. IIT Mandi also conferred its first Ph.D. degree to Ms. Priyanka Manchanda, a research scholar in School of Basic Sciences. Ms. Manchanda worked on a thesis titled "Magnetic Properties of Multilayers and Some Bulk Alloys: An Ab-Initio Study." In her thesis, Priyanka used ab-initio techniques and studied magnetic multilayers that are used in applications such as ultrahigh density magnetic recording, spin valves, and read heads of disk drives. She also studied control of magnetic properties with the application of external electric field in thin films and in organometallic systems. For more details on the convocation ceremony please visit the links below.
IIT Mandi 1st Convocation Brochure, Oct-2013
Click here to watch a prerecorded video of 2013 IIT Mandi Convocation
Press release on IIT Mandi 1st Convocation (2013) is below:
News report in Dainik Bhaskar; Dainik Jagran; Divya Himachal; Times of India, 20 October, 2013.
News report in Amar Ujala; Dainik Bhaskar; Dainik Jagran; Divya Himachal; Hindustan Times; Punjab Kesari, 21 October, 2013.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi, the youngest of all IITs and the only IIT in the Himalayas, celebrated its first convocation ceremony on 20th October, 2013. The convocation ceremony took place on IIT Mandi's permanent campus at Kamand and, among the new IITs, IIT Mandi is the first to hold its Convocation on its permanent campus. As part of this convocation, 94 B. Tech. students, 2 M.S. students, and 1 Ph.D. student graduated from the Institute. The chief guest on the occasion was Mr. Subodh Bhargava, Chairman, TATA Communications Ltd. In addition, the Guests of Honour included, Mr. M. Natarajan, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi, and Prof. V. S. Raju, Chairman, Naval Research Board, Government of India.
Currently, IIT Mandi has 564 students including 109 research scholars spread across its Mandi and Kamand campuses. The Institute offers B. Tech. in the three disciplines of Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, and Computer Science and Engineering. Also, the Institute offers M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in a wide variety of disciplines. Among the graduating students in the first convocation, there are 34 students graduating with a B. Tech. degree in Computer Science and Engineering, 36 students graduating with a B. Tech. degree in Electrical Engineering, and 24 students graduating with a B. Tech. degree in Mechanical Engineering. In addition 2 M.S. students and 1 Ph.D. student were conferred their degrees in the first Convocation.
The ceremony began in the backdrop of Himachali flute music which set the tone of this first Convocation in the Himalayas. Messages of felicitation had been received from the President of India, the Minister of Human Resource Development, and the Secretary, Ministry of Human Resource Development. The President of India's message was read out by the Registrar and in it Shri Pranab Mukherjee extended his best wishes for the success of the First Convocation of IIT Mandi. Dr. M. M. Pallam Raju, Minister of Human Resource Development, also sent a message where he expressed the hope that students graduating from IIT Mandi would contribute to the well-being of all Indians. Shri Ashok Thakur, Secretary, MHRD, also sent a message to IIT Mandi on the occasion of its first Convocation where he expressed that IIT Mandi could play a lead role in "domains such as IT, food processing, tourism, hydro-electric power, non-conventional energy system, highway construction and tunneling technologies, etc. which are high priority areas for these mountain states."
During the Convocation Ceremony, the Director of IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, presented the Director's report. In the report, he emphasized that, despite the challenges of building the institution in a remote Himalayan valley, the academic and research activities of the Institute had flourished. In his speech, the Director emphasized the unique curriculum of IIT Mandi which promotes interdisciplinarity. He also added that by connecting academic training with industrial exposure through workshops and classes and by establishing collaborations with foreign institutes the Institute was on the path to excellence.
On this occasion, Shri M. Natarajan, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi was present and also delivered a speech where he emphasized the need to blend new and traditional knowledge to come up with innovative solutions to today's problems. He emphasized to the graduating batch that through their continuous engagement with the alma mater, IIT graduates would be able to become torch bearers for science and technologies and for the advancement of the nation and society at large.
In his inspiring speech, Shri Subodh Bhargava shared with the graduating students some life lessons. He thus urged students to keep alive the same sense of impatience, inquisitiveness, and questioning spirit that they had as a student. He also emphasized the need to learn from failures and mistakes and most importantly to believe in oneself.
The speeches by dignitaries were followed by a pledge by graduating students. In the pledge, the students took an oath to utilize their knowledge in the service of our country in its march towards a just, inclusive, and sustainable society. The valedictorian speech, given by Raj Kamal Singh of the graduating batch, emphasized that though things had never been easy for the students being the first batch of the newest IIT, their experience had set them apart from their counterparts in other IITs. Raj Kamal mentioned that while people in other colleges have an existing extra-curricular setup waiting for them to excel through, the students had to setup everything from scratch. He mentioned that the academic curriculum was also designed from scratch and stabilized. Furthermore, Raj Kamal mentioned that, "we knew it wasn't going to be easy to cope up with the new environment and excel. This new start, however, helped us gain unique knowledge and experience that set us apart from our counterparts in other institutes." The valedictorian emphasized that it was now the task of the graduated students as alumni to establish the brand name of IIT Mandi.
As part of the ceremony IIT Mandi's first institute awards were given out to a few proud recipients. Devinder Yadav was the recipient of President of India Gold Medal for outstanding excellence in academic studies. He also received Institute Silver Medal for excelling in the discipline of Computer Science and Engineering. Saurabh Jain was the recipient of Director's Gold Medal for outstanding all round proficiency in both academic and extracurricular activities. V. Vignesh received the Institute Silver Medal for excelling in the discipline of Electrical Engineering. Mrinmoy Biswas was the recipient of the Institute Silver Medal for excelling in the discipline of Mechanical Engineering. In addition, Amanjot Kaur received the Balasundaram Endowment Prize for German for outstanding excellence in the minor stream in German Language.
Throughout the programme, the sense of pride and achievement was palpable among the students, their families and the faculty and staff of the Institute. As the sun bathed the beautiful Kamand valley, the first Convocation Ceremony ended with a ray of hope and joy that is sure to inspire the students and faculty of this Institute in the years ahead.
For more Information contact:
Mr. Naresh Bhandari, Indian Institute of Technology, Mandi, Himachal Pradesh, India
Phone: +91-981-601-6376; Email: nsbhandari[at]iitmandi.ac.in; Website: www.iitmandi.ac.in
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi celebrated the Ground Breaking for the construction of hostels and faculty residences in its North Campus at Kamand on 8th October 2013.
The current work involves the construction of 152 residential multistoried apartments for faculty. Each apartment is expected to be 1,700 square feet in area and it would have three bedrooms with attached bathrooms, a kitchen, and a living room. Also, the north campus is expected to provide hostel accommodation and dining facility for 1,500 undergraduate and graduate students studying at IIT Mandi.
This project would cost approximately INR 180 crores and it is expected to be completed in the next two years. On this occasion, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi, Dr. R. C. Sawhney, Registrar IIT Mandi, Dr. Anand Srivastava (Dean (Infrastructure) IIT Mandi, Mr. K. N. Rai Advisor, Er. A. K. Jain Advisor, Er. Sudhir Kumar ADG CPWD, Mr. A. K. Rastogi CPM, and Mr. Prag Shah, Vice President of HR Deptt of M/S Supreme Infrastructure Ltd., were present.
The total gross floor area of this construction in North campus is expected to be 73,500 square meters. It would provide shelter for 1,500 students, 150 faculty, and about 300 technical and admin staffs. The current construction in the north campus is expected to accommodate the Institute's growth until about 2018.
Ms Priyanka Manchanda (Roll No. D11048), a doctoral student at IIT Mandi has successfully defended her thesis on 7th Oct 2013. The research work reported in her thesis, "Magnetic properties of multilayers and some bulk alloys: An ab-initio study", has been carried out under the supervision of Dr. Arti Kashyap, an Associate Professor at IIT Mandi. Ms Priyanka will be awarded IIT Mandi's first Ph.D. degree during the Institute's first convocation to be held on 20th Oct 2013.
A brief description of her thesis is
"Magnetic multilayers consist of magnetic and non-magnetic materials and possess exotic scientific properties such as oscillatory interlayer exchange coupling and giant magneto-resistance. These magnetic multilayers are used in many applications such as ultrahigh density magnetic recording, spin valves and read head of hard disks. In this thesis, we have explored various magnetic thin films and multilayers to study the magnetization and magnetic anisotropy, that is, ease to change the magnetization direction. The main focus is to study the magnetic multilayer of 3d/4d and 3d/5d transition metal elements. Such systems exhibit high magnetic moment and magnetic anisotropy and therefore are useful in many applications. Further, control of magnetic properties with the application of external electric field is studied. The significant change in magnetic moment and magnetic anisotropy energy is observed in the presence of external electric field. Such systems can be used in electric-field controlled magnetic data storage and switching devices."
A team of 15 undergraduate students from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), USA are on a visit to Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi for two months in September-October 2013. These students worked with 15 IIT Mandi undergraduate students in solving some socio-economic issues of Mandi and Kamand. The students are divided into five teams of six students each, where teams consist of equal number of students from WPI and IIT Mandi. The teams are being coordinated by Dr. Ingrid Shockey (Assistant Teaching Professor, WPI) and Dr. Arti Kashyap (Associate Professor, IIT Mandi), Dr. Shail Shankar being the overall coordinator for ISTP at IIT Mandi. The five teams are working on five different projects aimed at finding best possible solutions to problems of traffic congestion, proper cleanliness, postal service in the Mandi town, the problem of drinking water, issues related to Ecotourism and the impact of IIT Mandi in the villages around Mandi and Kamand. The IIT Mandi faculty mentoring the five teams include, Dr. Rajeshwari Dutt, Dr. Bharat Singh Rajpurohit, Dr. Arti Kashyap, Dr. Samar, Dr. Suman, and Dr. Manu V. Devadevan.
Hitherto, students of IIT Mandi have been receiving several courses from other institutions by video-conferencing through the National Knowledge Network (NKN). In the Autumn 2013 semester, for the first time, IIT Mandi's course no. ME 618: Stealth Technology [Infrared (IR) Signatures] is being broadcast from IIT Mandi by video-conferencing through NKN. It is being received in National Institute of Technology Hamirpur (Mechanical Dept. for Masters' Students) and Program – Air Defense (Scientists), R.C.I. (DRDO) Hyderabad. This course is being conducted by Dr. Shripad P. Mahulikar, Professor, School of Engineering, who is on deputation at IIT Mandi from IIT Bombay (Aerospace Dept.). The research of Prof. Mahulikar in the strategic area of IR-Stealth of Aerospace Vehicles is internationally visible through his widely cited journal papers.
IIT Mandi organised a workshop on Sept 1, 2013 for the students of Shoolini University to train them on learning "how to develop applications for Aakash tablet". Total sixty students of B. Tech and M. Tech, participated in this one day workshop. Apart from forty five students from Shoolini University, Solan Himachal Pradesh, fifteen students of first year from IIT Mandi also learnt the skills." This was second workshop of its kind for students other than IIT students, first being organized for Sundernagar Govt Engineering college. IIT Mandi students have been involved into developing applications for Aakash tablet as part of the activity of Aakash Application Development Lab.
IIT Mandi is all set to welcome it's new batch of budding engineers and scientists, who are joining the institute in the first week of August with the registration process starting on August 3, 2013. The students will reach Mandi on August 2. The Orientation Week following their arrival has been lined up with a variety of events to welcome and orient these students, which would come to a close on August 6.
IIT Mandi attracted 118 bright students in the year 2013 through JEE admission procedure. Out of them, 39 students were admitted to CS and EE branch each and 40 to ME branch.
Institute's policy to encourage girls to join IIT Mandi is continuing to yield results. IIT Mandi despite its remote location has the female count of 8 per cent of the total students joining the Institute.
A large part of the students joining IIT Mandi belong to Rajasthan, UP, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh. IIT Mandi drew about 20 per cent of the total students from Rajasthan, 13 per cent from Uttar Pradesh, 11 per cent from Andhra Pradesh and 12 per cent from New Delhi and Haryana. Students from about 20 states of the country are admitted to the Institute with Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir sending one student each.
One week short term course on the Finite Element Method for Engineering Applications (FEMEA) was organised during July 1st and 5th, 2013 at IIT Mandi. Finite Element Analysis (FEA) has now become an integral part of design process in automotive, aviation, construction and various consumer and industrial goods industries.
The short term course was inaugurated by the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves. In his inaugural speech on the kind of research India needs presently, he emphasized the importance of designing a product and owning its Intellectual Property Rights. On the occasion, the Dean Academics, Prof. Ramesh Orunganti, the Dean Finance, Prof. Lalit Malhotra and Mentor Prof. B.K. Mishra were also present.
The course was particularly beneficial for engineers and scientists working in structural, fluidflow, environmental, geo-technical, thermal engineering, research organizations, Govt. R&D departments, consulting companies, and self-employed practitioners engaged in the analysis, design, planning, construction, operation, maintenance and management. The course provided an excellent opportunity for the participants to interact with one another and discuss problems and solutions of mutual interest. At the end of the course, the participants were in a position to identify and select appropriate FEA methodologies for their specific condition.
It was a learning experience for 16 participants who attended the course and about 17 participants benefitted from the course through online broadcasting as they could not be physically present in the institute. The valedictory function of the course was organised at Kamand campus in which the participants were given the certificate of participation.
IIT Mandi organized its first Research Fair on June 26th, 2013. It was a good platform where about 40 research scholars came together to showcase their in-depth work. The researchers gave oral presentations on their scholarly work with enthusiasm in front of faculty members and students. Later in the day, the participants explained their work in detail in a poster presentation.
The fair got underway with inspiring speeches by the Dean (Academics) Prof. Ramesh Oruganti and the Deputy Director, Prof. Lalit Malhotra. On the occasion, Prof. Oruganti said, "A very good start has been made in organising a research conference based on student research at IIT Mandi. Now, this has to be taken forward in the coming years to make this into major research event." Prof. Malhotra, Dean (SRIC) too lauded the efforts of the first batch of the research scholars who started everything from scratch and have managed to perform exceptionally well with their papers getting published in reputed international journals.
In fact, the research fair was an occasion when researchers managed to come out of the cocoon of their own research and got to know about other scholars' work. It gave them an opportunity to interact with one another and explore the possibility of interdisciplinary research. Dr. Tricha from IIT Mandi said, "The research fair was quite informative, now that I am aware of the research work in various fields progressing here at IIT Mandi, I could think of collaborating with the faculty and research scholars to work in the area of my expertise."
Dr. Bindu, Associate Dean (Research), while delivering the vote of thanks, appreciated the quality work done by the research scholars in their respective fields and hoped that the next research fair would attract more participants. She thanked the students and the faculty organizing committee for organizing the first research fair.
At the end of the day, the best oral presentation award was given to Himadri Chakraborti (Physics) and Runa Barik (Computer science) by the judges. The best poster presentation prize was shared by two scholars Tushar Kant Swain for 'Modeling of 2-D Supersonic Combustor with 3 Struts using S-A Turbulence Model' and Anna Varughese for 'Simulation Studies on Dynamics of Nucleation'. The panel of judges consisted of Prof. SP Mahulikar, Dr. Tricha Anjali and Prof. Subrata Ray who spent considerable time asking probing questions, giving valuable advice to the researchers and judging the presentations.
A three-day Workshop on 'Strategic Research Vision to Build a Smarter Grid ' was organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) between June 27-29, 2013.
Prof. T. A. Gonsalves, Director IIT Mandi and Prof. S. Mahulikar, IIT Mandi, inaugurated the Workshop at the Kamand Campus of IIT Mandi. In his inaugural address Prof. Gonsalves highlighted the accomplishments and research activities of IIT Mandi. While sharing the vision of IIT Mandi, as an Institute 'to be a leader in science and technology education, knowledge creation and innovation, in an India marching towards a just, inclusive and sustainable society' and one of its thrust area 'to devise globally recognized solutions for the problems of society and industry, particularly in the fragile eco-system of the Himalayas', he emphasized the relevance of this timely Workshop by which different groups of society could come together to solve the challenges of security, stability and reliability for a sustainable energy sector. Prof. Gonsalves delivered the keynote lecture on economical DC Micro-gird to solve the problems of energy deficit and reliability issues in power grid especially for Indian rural scenario. He elaborated on the concept by explaining that DC Micro-grid would utilize and convert direct sunlight available free to us. In his keynote lecture, Prof. Gonsalves laid down the strong needs for innovative and low-cost technology development suited especially for the rural sector. Prof. Mahulikar addressed the gathering by highlighting the need of integrated research planning for energy as well as natural resources in India.
The main objective of this Workshop was to facilitate the discussion on the Research Vision to Build a Smarter Grid and its suitable applications for efficient power grid operations in smart grid environments. The various issues, problems and challenges of the electric grid operation, management and control are described in the context of high renewable energy. The power systems are changing very rapidly due to the new technological developments and formulations of new regulatory polices of the government. As the leading researchers from the country were invited, the workshop envisioned a well-defined road map for the development and deployment of Smart Grid in India.
Looking beyond 2020, the challenges for electricity networks are likely to increase. There exists a general consensus that the challenges of climate change and system security, in particular the ability to accommodate significant volumes of decentralized and renewable generation, require that the network infrastructure must be upgraded to enable smart operations. Building a smarter grid lies at the heart of required major changes to the way we supply and use energy. The large increases in electricity generation from intermittent/highly variable renewable resource, the increase of stressing/narrowly conditions on transmission system, a massive decoupling between generation/load caused by dc system and several other features expected into the future electricity networks will negatively affect the system security. The reliable and sophisticated solutions to the foreseen issues of the future networks are creating dynamically-intelligent application/solutions to be deployed during the incremental process of building the smarter grid.
The future electricity networks and their potential issues require looking beyond the existing research frontiers irrespective of the disciplinary boundaries. For this reason, the discussion of the future development on sophisticated/intelligent applications/solutions is the key research point to provide the critical importance to economic and social welfare into future smarter power networks. The solutions using the advanced technologies/methodologies were discussed. Several technical studies based on the recent research work were also presented.
Earlier, addressing the participants, Workshop coordinators Dr. B. S. Rajpurohit and Dr. Samar Agnihotri emphasized the development of technological and regulatory solutions to build a healthier and economical power grid with high penetration of renewable energy sources like small hydro energy, wind energy, solar energy etc. especially for Indian power sectors. Workshop coordinators said that meaningful discussions in such an august gathering would definitely lead to enrichment of all the participants and would carry the message throughout the society. This Workshop drew more than 25 participants from academic institutions, power utilities and industries from different states including UP, Punjab, MP, Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal, and Uttarakhand.
Several distinguished speakers from all around India discussed several aspects of Smart Grids. Prof S. N. Singh from IIT Kanpur, Dr. N. M. Pindoriya from IIT Gandhinagar, Er. Vikram Gandotra from SIEMENS Ltd. and Dr. Tricha Anjali & Dr. Manoj Thakur from IIT Mandi were among the speakers, who included eminent personalities and who shared their expertise with the participants. A trip to Parashar Lake was arranged on the last day.
Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and IIT Mandi financially supported the Workshop.
A four-day national workshop on 'Turbomachinery aerodynamics: design and optimization using CFD' kicked off at IIT Mandi on June 21, 2013. The company GearedOx, which is incubated by IIT Mandi , organised the workshop. The workshop aimed at bridging the gap by enhancing participants' skills and focusing on advanced tools that can be used in teaching and research at academic-level.
It focused on advanced theoretical fundamentals of turbomachines with industrial practices using CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) and FEA (Finite Element Analysis) tools. The participants also got practical hands-on industrial exposure together with interactive sessions with experts from industry and professors from IITs.
The speakers in the workshop were Dr. J. S. Rao (Chief Scientist officer, Altair Engineering, India), Dr. Shripad P. Mahulikar (Aerospace Department, IIT Bombay), Dr.Sudarshan Kumar (Aerospace Department, IIT Bombay), Sanjay Kuma and Dr. O. P. Singh (School of Engineering, IIT Mandi). About six speakers from industry also interacted with the participants. The companies that participated in the workshop were Altair Engineering Inc., CD-adapco, Geoinformatics Consultants Pvt. Ltd. and Innovent Engineering Solutions Pvt. Ltd.
On the inaugural day of the workshop, the Director IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, the Deputy Director IIT Mandi, Prof. Lalit Malhotra, the Dean (Academics), Prof. Ramesh orunganti, the Dean (students), Prof. B. Subramanian, Distinguished visiting faculty, Prof. Subrata Ray and faculty, IIT Mandi, Dr. Vishal were welcomed. The Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Gonsalves gave an overall account of how IIT Mandi is growing rapidly in the Himalayas with students working hard to solve society's problem through their efforts in the field of design and innovation. He emphasized on generating intellectual properties instead of focusing on service-related jobs as exponential growth is only possible when we work on innovation and new ideas.
The guest speaker, Dr. J. S. Rao (Chief Scientist officer, Altair Engineering, India), while addressing the participants said, "We need to go back to Science for innovation". He added, "Entire engineering courses can be covered in five subjects that are needed for making a product: Solid mechanics, fluid mechanics, heat transfer, electromagnetic theory and signal processing".
The workshop drew participants from the country's premier institutes like IITs, NITs, Bits Pilani, BARC, NAL etc.; industry professionals and faculty members from engineering institutes. The participants were impressed and inspired with Dr. J. S. Rao's interactive session, which was quite informative and enlightening.
Ten winners were announced (four faculty and three students and three industry professionals) as part of the competition held by Altair Engineering. All the winners will get free license of HyperWorks software suite for a year and free training in Delhi for three days.
IIT Mandi hosted the second workshop on Text-to-speech synthesis (TTS) in which the coordinators and project staff from all 12 institutes and companies involved with the project—IIT Madras, CDAC Tiruvananthapuram, CDAC Mumbai, CDAC Kolkata, IIIT Hyderabad, IISc Bangalore, IIT Guwahati, SSNCE Chennai, University of Gauhati, DA-IICT Gujarat, IIT Kharagpur, IIT Mandi—participated. The two-day workshop was organised on June 14th-15th, 2013 at the Kamand campus.
In the text-to-speech synthesis (TTS) systems, speech waveform is generated from the given text. It can be a promising device to readout the information from cellphones where reading text is difficult due to its small displays and extremely useful for "visually challenged" to get into the mainstream society.
The project for Development of TEXT to SPEECH SYSTEM in Indian Languages is sponsored by DIT (Department of Information Technology). In the workshop, a live system was shown which could synthesize the speech waveform in 12 different Indian languages. All the TTS systems were build using common platform (open source code). Members of the consortium working on the project have also demonstrated the small footprint of TTS system which can be ported in Android platform-based mobile phones.
The progress made by the team working on the project was appreciated by the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. T. A. Gonsalves and the Dean (Academics) Prof. Ramesh Orunganti. In the workshop, various issues concerning the project were discussed like the research issues to improve the naturalness and intelligibility of synthesized speech; importance of developing TTS system for a new language with a very small amount of speech data and action plan for the next year to improve the existing TTS system.
Integrated Circuit (IC) devices play an indispensable role in modern society, from industrial applications such as computer controlled and operated machinery to mechtronics, telecommunication, and daily computing needs. In this endeavor, researchers at IIT Mandi recently designed and developed certain fabrication and manufacturing methods for ICs that overcome many of the inherent problems present in the current methods.
In today's world, semiconductor chips play a vital role in day-to-day life by making our life pleasurable, safer, and healthier.As semiconductor-device manufacturers compete to offer high performing, low-heat generating, and cost-effective devices, there has been a continuous drive to reduce the IC-feature sizes. Reducing the size of features boost speed and improves the economics of manufacturing by allowing more transistors (often more than 50 million) to be placed on a single chip. The radical improvements in IC performance stem primarily due to the interconnection of millions of active components such as transistors and diodes on a single silicon chip.The smallest components on a chip are transistors (basically these are switches), and there can be billions of such transistors on a chip. Together these transistors perform faster computing and contain memories that collate huge amounts of data. In addition, reducing the chip size is important as small-sized chips are less costly to manufacture.
According to the International Semiconductor Roadmap, the technology that enables one to print finer features on chips is (nano) lithography, which historically follows the renowned Moore's Law for IC-miniaturization. From the beginning, photo lithography tools have been used to enable low cost and high speed transfer of circuit design patterns onto silicon substrates, making mass-manufacturing possible. For example, lithography lays down the foundation for constructing3D IC structures. As the degree of integration of electronic components in ICs increases from a few to hundreds of millions of transistors, the demand on the performance of lithography tools also evolves. With the IC feature-size having already moved towards the 22 nm node and the current 193 nm wavelength, the Deep Ultraviolet Lithography (DUVL) tool sets have reached its potential for further development. Thus, we need some next-generation lithography tools to be used by the industry.
Among the potential next-generation tools(e.g., Extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL), EB, X-ray and nano-imprinting technologies), it is expected that EUVL at 13.5 nm wavelength has good prospects of being adopted for high volume production in the near future. In addition, compared to DUVL-based technology, EUVL has two major advantages. Firstly,it is cost-effective,has higher unit throughput, and a simplified working. Secondly, it could be extended to realize even smaller feature sizes (16nm or 10nm). Therefore, it is anticipated that EUVL will become a major technology for next-generation IC fabrication and manufacturing.
However, current implementations of EUV lithography faces several challenges including that of finding photoresists that can concurrently achieve narrow line width around 16 nm, small line edge roughness at 3σ (1.5nm), and high photo sensitivity at 2-10mJ/cm2. Prof. Kenneth Gonsalves, Visiting Distinguished Professor, IIT Mandi, developed a unique strategy to deal with key problems causing the technical deficiencies in the current EUV photo resist technology. He successfully demonstrated the feasibility of developing a EUV photo resist with high sensitivity, high resolution, and low-line roughness.
The current project at IIT Mandi encompasses the design and development of resists that are directly sensitive to photons without utilizing the concept of chemical amplification (CARs) and addresses many of the inherent problems of currently used chemically amplified resist technology (e.g., acid diffusion, sensitivity, post exposure instability). The newly developed resist materials, while highly sensitive to photons of various wavelengths, function as non-chemically amplified resists. This new resist design is accomplished by polymers that are prepared from monomers containing sulfonium groups.
In order for a polymer to be directly sensitive to exposures at the 13.5 nm wavelength, a highly sensitive group must be introduced into the polymer units. Sulfonium groups have been found to be sensitive to UV photons. For this reason, sulfonium groups have been chosen as photon sensitive groups in non-CA resists. In the development of this technology, Prof. Gonsalves discovered that polymers prepared from monomers containing sulfonium components are highly sensitive to DUV photons and act as non-chemically amplified (non-CA) negative resist materials. It was also observed that these non-CA resists are sensitive to e-beam irradiation and would therefore be useful for EUVL down to the 16 nm node and below.
At IIT Mandi, working with an interdisciplinary team comprising of chemists, material scientists, and electronics engineers, Prof. Gonsalves has been currently developing new non-chemically amplified resists of sizes 16 nm to 10 nm node. In this program,the research team has successfully developed and tested resists that show resolution at 20 nm under electron-beam exposures. Having shown the proof-of-concept in the first year of the project, these prototypes will now be tested for imaging at the 16 nm and lower node under EUV exposure in the second year.In addition, additional hybrid organic–inorganic resists that achieve 16 nm node sizes are in the pipeline.
The project team is headed at IIT Mandi by Prof.Gonsalves as the principal investigator. Additional co-PIs at IIT Mandi are Assistant Professors: Dr.Subrata Ghosh, Dr.Pradeep Parameswaran, School of Basic Sciences; and, Dr.Satinder Sharma School of Computing and Electrical Engineering. The Postdoctoral research Fellows on the project are: Dr. V.S.V. Satyanarayana, Dr.Vikram Singh Tomar, and Dr.Vishwanath Kalyani.
IIT Mandi acknowledges financial support for this project by Intel Corp USA administered through the Semiconductor Research Corp (SRC) USA.Also, IIT Mandi acknowledges use of facilities at INUP Mumbai.
In sync with IIT Mandi's vision to produce professionals capable of leading efforts towards innovative products and processes, students have, yet again, won prestigious laurels for their innovative product—the robotic arm designed under the Project-Junior
The Project-Junior is the name given to a new form of augmented reality (AR) interface developed for the computing devices by IIT Mandi students. The basic idea behind the project was to provide user with better means of interacting with the computers.
The students' brainchild bagged the second place under mechanical division at Jed-i (Joy of Engineering, Design and Innovation) project challenge, Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore, competing against 69 teams from all over India on June 14, 2013. The Jed-i project challenge is an annual event designed to identify and showcase the best final year engineering project. "The compact robotic arm designed by us as part of our final-year B.Tech project received great appreciation from the judges and top technocrats of the country," the winning team said. The project was also selected among the top 10 projects at Next Big Idea at IIM Bangalore and top rated for its potential to hit the markets in the near future.
Junior, the robotic arm, resembles a table lamp. Gestures beneath the lamp and touch on the projected screen on the surface of the table are the main means of giving input to the device. Junior is completely automated. The body of Junior can orient the projector screen in any manner the user specifies, thus breaking free from the physical limitations of the traditional screen. Using gestures and touch would mean that the interaction with the machine is more natural and intuitive. An added advantage of the projector system is that the digital information can now be blended with the physical environment and objects. At present, Junior (the robotic arm) can accept four gestures, two for zooming in and out, one for object augmentation and one for stand-by. When a user places an object in front of the robot, it captures the images of the object and based on image search, finds relevant information about the object and projects it on the table beside the object.
The device was designed in CAD and then was printed using 3-D printer at IIT Mandi's Mechanical workshop. The camera mounted on the head of the lamp recognizes the gesture made by the user and projects the appropriate information at the desired spot on the table. The image and video processing required for the above function is carried out on a computer that is integrated to the camera-projector setup. The desired information is obtained by a scripting program that runs on the computer. The computer then sends the control signals to both the projector (as to what information to display) and the robotic arm controller (as to where to move and project).
Its potential applications are in R&D labs, hospitals and medical centers of research and learning, academic institutions, libraries and classrooms for enhanced learning, offices (as a replacement for the traditional computer peripherals), malls and showrooms for advertisements and blending digital information with the physical products, homes for enhanced user interaction with computing devices.
The students' team consists of Akshay J. Kulkarni (Electrical Engineering), Anurag Jakhotia (Mechanical Engineering), Chinmay D. Bhagat (Electrical Engineering), Kanhaiya Mishra (Electrical Engineering), Nikki Kumar (Electrical Engineering), Shyam Sundar (Mechanical Engineering), Vignesh Venkateshwaran (Electrical Engineering).
The students worked on the project under the guidance of Dr. Anil Sao (School of Computing and Electrical Engineering, IIT Mandi) and Dr. Om Prakash Singh (School of Engineering, IIT Mandi).
IIT Mandi hosted the Graduation Dinner for the first ever batch (2009-13) of B.Tech. students at Kamand Campus on June 6, 2013. It was preceded by group photo sessions at both Mandi and Kamand Campuses of IIT Mandi.
      On the historic evening the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves wished the students the very best and hoped that they will be successful in making positive impact in society with their hard work and perseverance. The Dean (Students) Prof. B. Subramanian congratulated the students for getting handsome job offers through campus placements and looked forward to having a long-lasting relationship with them as alumni of the Institute.
       Dr. Vishal Singh Chauhan (School of Engineering) said that he felt priviledged to have taught the first batch and admired them for their hardwork and dedication. He asked the students not to get bogged down in the highly competitive professional world but retain their peace of mind and be happy. Students too shared their fond memories of the four-years spent at IIT Mandi. For most of them, it was a nostalgic moment as they remembered the past fun-filled days of companionship and learning. Setting the tone for future Graduation Dinners, the students were also given mementoes by the Director and the evening ended with a formal dinner at Kamand, IIT Mandi.
      IIT Mandi hosted the Graduation Dinner for the first ever batch (2009-13) of B.Tech. students at Kamand Campus on June 6, 2013. It was preceded by group photo sessions at both Mandi and Kamand Campuses of IIT Mandi.
      On the historic evening the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves wished the students the very best and hoped that they will be successful in making positive impact in society with their hard work and perseverance. The Dean (Students) Prof. B. Subramanian congratulated the students for getting handsome job offers through campus placements and looked forward to having a long-lasting relationship with them as alumni of the Institute.
       Dr. Vishal Singh Chauhan (School of Engineering) said that he felt priviledged to have taught the first batch and admired them for their hardwork and dedication. He asked the students not to get bogged down in the highly competitive professional world but retain their peace of mind and be happy. Students too shared their fond memories of the four-years spent at IIT Mandi. For most of them, it was a nostalgic moment as they remembered the past fun-filled days of companionship and learning. Setting the tone for future Graduation Dinners, the students were also given mementoes by the Director and the evening ended with a formal dinner at Kamand, IIT Mandi.
      IIT Mandi students are encouraged to acquire techno-cultural, communication and administrative skills by not only participating in various events but also organizing and managing them with full vigour. The Inter-hostel technical show Avishkar-2013 was one such event organised on May 25th, 2013. The show comprised of contests like quick thesis, fire in the hole, dementia, etc.
       Students groups from the eight technical clubs of Science and Technology Society of IIT Mandi (S&TC) displayed various projects during the day, which won applause aplenty from the visitors including the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves and other faculty members. The remote-controlled ICRC car, astronomical binoculars, demo of Akash applications, SCRI magazine - Accent and work of Programming Club and WING were on display.
      In the evening, the chief guests, Prof. Ramesh Oruganti, Prof. B.Subramanian and Dr. Suman Kalyan Pal, inaugurated the S&TC Newsletter. On the occasion, they spoke about the relevance of S&TC for the engineering students and discussed the various projects displayed in the exhibition. The participants were given the certificates of appreciation. Coordinators of various clubs were also awarded for their leadership qualities.
      Suvalsar, the first year hostel won the trophy. Aarjav Malhotra won the Technically active freshman trophy for his creativity and active involvement in the club.
       Design-thinking followed by design-doing results into innovation and it happened at IIT Mandi as the students' grey cells sparred to create several innovative and socially relevant products. The students showcased their products in working conditions during the Open House of Design Practicum (Prototype Development) on June 2nd, 2013 at the Kamand campus.
      The product that impressed the judges and visitors alike was the low cost 3-D printer based on the FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) technology. Compared to the existing FDM 3D printers in the market, whose operating temperature is about 3200 C, students built the 3D printer that works at 1800 C, thus incurring less cooling cost and increasing the life of the machine. The printer printed 3D objects like wrench, cylinder, IIT Mandi logo, etc. This product was given the first prize.
      With rapidly depleting non-renewable resources becoming a concern, students designed a hybrid mobile charger that uses renewable wind and solar energy to charge the mobiles and tablets. Because of the low resistant circuit design of the charger, it can charge a mobile even without direct sunlight falling on it i.e. charging can be done even while comfortably sitting inside the house. The product was awarded the second prize.
      IIT Mandi's innovative students also found solutions to every homemaker's woes with products like 'Self moving cloth rack and folding machine' and 'Three-in-one machine vacuum cleaner-cum-mopping-cum-floor dryer'. Self-moving cloths rack and folding machine was designed to tackle the problem of clothes getting wet or remaining outside after dark. The machine takes the clothes inside the wardrobe automatically when it rains or turns dark. The folding machine can fold the clothes if they are laid on it. The complete clean-up solution was provided by three-in-one machine vacuum cleaner-cum-mopping cum floor dryer. The fully automatic machine senses obstacles and cleans up without any human aid. It can also be remote-controlled. It has dual charging system i.e. the battery can be charged through the household power supply as well as solar energy.
      Another useful product designed was the automatic trash compactor. It is a fully automatic machine that compresses trash put into thus reducing its volume. It can hold trash almost 9-10 times more than normal-sized dustbins and applies a force of 300 Newtons. Another of its innovative feature is that when the compactor reaches its maximum limit then it will automatically send a signal to the base station (the place where all the compactors are managed), which will tell them the trash bin ID number for the dustbin to be emptied. It can be used in office premises, college premises or even households.
      Other interesting products displayed on the occasion were Multipurpose Humanoid Hand, Hardcopy to Softcopy Convertor, Automatic Braking Systems for Railways to curb train accidents, Automatic Wheel Chair-Cum-Bed, Dust suppression water sprinkler, Intelligent Parking System, Automatic paper recycler, Seed Sowing Robot for hilly region, Volumetric 3D Led Display, Auto-Navigation Tool for Blind People, Home Automation System, Bike on the back and Movement Tracking Device.
IIT Mandi is one of the five IITs who are developing applications for Aakash tablets. Other IITs being IIT Bombay, IIT Madras, IIT Kanpur, IIT Guwahati and IIT Kharagpur where AADLs (Aakash application development labs) have been set up.
A "Workshop on competent use of Aakash tablet and on Android" was organized on May 5, 2013 to impart training to the students on the technology employed to develop applications for Akash tablet. About 65 students from J. L. N. Engineering College Sundernagar, Himachal Pradesh participated in this workshop.
A workshop for IIT Mandi staff was organised at the Kamand campus of Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) on April 27, 2013. The workshop was addressed by the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Prof. Lalit Malhotra, Prof. Subrata Ray, and the Registrar, Dr. R.C. Sawhney.
About 160 staff members of IIT Mandi participated actively in the group discussions on various topics related to the speedy progress of the Institute, which is in its growing phase. The IIT Mandi administration noted down the key inputs given by the staff members during the group discussions, which would be helpful in smooth and efficient functioning at the basic level of the Institute.
The workshop ended with the dham (traditional Mandi meal)
The new buildings in the Kamand campus of Indian institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) were formally inaugurated by the Hon'ble Minister for Human Resource Development, Dr. M. M. PallamRaju, on 9th March, 2013. Shri.Virbhadra Singh, Hon'ble Chief Minister, Himachal Pradesh presided over the function. Other dignitaries gracing the occasion included: Shri M. Natarajan, Padma Shree and Chairman, Board of Governors of IIT Mandi; Shri. Kaul Singh Thakur, Hon'ble Minister for Health & Family Welfare, and Shri. Anil Sharma, Hon'ble Minister for Rural Development, Panchyati Raj & Veterinary, Himachal Pradesh.
As part of the ceremony, Dr.PallamRaju inaugurated the newly constructed "Advanced Materials Research Centre". This building will house labs and sophisticated instruments worth about Rs. 20 crores for designing and studying novel materials. Researchers will investigate the basic structure of materials, and develop novel materials for electrical, electronics, biological, and other applications. It will be used by about 40 postdocs and PhD scholars led by an inter-disciplinary team of 15 faculty, including two Distinguished Visiting Professors: Prof. K.E. Gonsalves from the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, and Prof. Subrata Ray, formerly with IIT-Roorkee.
In addition, the Chief Minister inaugurated the "Prashar Hostel" building, a newly constructed student hostel at Kamand. The hostel buildings, patterned after the Himachal village architecture, have a number of architectural features to make them a home away from home for the students. The buildings have insulated double walls and roofs, and double-glazed windows. This is designed to protect the students from the heat of summer and the chilling cold of the Kamand winters.
Also, as part of the day's celebrations, Dr. PallamRaju gave a valedictory address to the India-UK Advanced Technology Centre (IU-ATC) workshop being held at the Kamand Campus. IU-ATC is the largest India-UK ICT research collaboration, which employs 200 scientists in both countries. The workshop brought scientists from India and UK in a two day event to discuss progress on the project that focuses on advanced telecommunication networks and multimedia services.
IIT Mandi has made great strides since its start at IIT Roorkee on 27th July, 2009. After shifting to a transit campus in Mandi in mid-2010, development of the Kamand campus was taken up at high priority. The 530-acre campus is located on the bank of the Uhl River at Kamand, 16 km from Mandi. With the inauguration of its new campus, the Institute has attained the distinction of being the first among the new IITs to have full residential and academic facility on its permanent campus. This remarkable feat was due to the hard work put in by the faculty, staff and students. The Government of Himachal and the people of Mandi have provided all support. The CPWD put in extraordinary efforts to get the work completed despite the difficult terrain and vagaries of weather. The building design is done by M/s BDP and the major construction by M/s Ahluwalia Contracts. Other works are handled by several local contractors.
IIT Mandi's move into its new campus has progressed at a rapid pace. In April, 2012, IIT Mandi broke ground for 11 new buildings in its South Campus. These buildings with a floor area of 10,000 square meters comprise of residential and academic blocks. During 2012, a number of renovated Animal Husbandry buildings, some prefab buildings, and two brand new permanent buildings were completed and put to use at Kamand. In fact, in March, 2012, a Mechanical Workshop started functioning in a renovated hay store. In May 2012, IIT Mandi commissioned its first sophisticated instrument, a powder X-ray diffractometer (XRD) worth Rs. 1.75 crores, in the renovated Stable Complex.
In June 2012, Professor Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, was the first to shift with his wife and dog Rusty to his newly-constructed residence on the Kamand campus. A few MS and PhD students shifted with him. On 23rd September 2012, the new Dining Hall was inaugurated and the 108 students of the 2nd year B. Tech. batch occupied their hostels. By the end of 2013, IIT Mandi expects to have 600 students, 70 faculty and more than 100 staff members in its fully residential campus at Kamand.
IIT Mandi's new campus has seen the renovation and reshaping of a previously existing stable of the Animal Husbandry Department at Kamand. The stable now houses a PC Lab, Physics and Chemistry Labs, and a 120-seat Electronic Classroom connected to the National Knowledge Network (NKN). The NKN allows IIT Mandi to enhance their academic efforts by connecting to other IITs for distance education through virtual classrooms. In the initial stages, for rapid construction purposes, IIT Mandi has chosen to use low-cost eco-friendly prefab buildings made of bamboo materials.
Currently, the facilities on the new campus include a Mechanical Engineering Workshop, Computer Lab, Conference room, NKN classrooms, medical unit with ambulance, newly-constructed dining hall, provision and stationery stores, PNB branch with ATM, SBI ATM, administrative office, engineering office, and faculty and staff quarters. The Kamand campus has a number of sports facilities for IIT students that include volleyball, badminton, table tennis, cycling, hiking, and trekking. The new campus has hosted several important national meetings held at IIT Mandi. It iscurrently hosting its first international workshop with 30 participants from UK and 70 from India.
The construction in the North Campus will start soon. The construction of 1,15,000sqm at a cost of about Rs. 500 crores is planned to be completed by 2015. The campus will then accommodate over 1,600 students and 160 faculty, sufficient for the growth of the Institute up to 2018. The coming of an IIT to Himachal can be seen as a turning point for Himachal and J&K. IIT Mandi is expected to give this Himalayan region a world-renowned centre for learning, research and innovation, a source of technology solutions for the unique problems of the Himalayan region, an institution that will nurture the future engineers, scientists and scholars who will take India to global leadership in the 21st century.
A two day workshop of the India-UK Advanced Technology Centre (IU-ATC) of Excellence in Next Generation Networks, Systems, and Services is being held at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi on March 8th-9th, 2013. This workshop titled "8th Indo-UK Technical Workshop on Next Generation Network Systems and Services" is the first international workshop to be held at the new Kamand Campus of IIT Mandi. About 30 participants have come from the UK, with about 50 from various parts of India. The valedictory address for this workshop will be delivered by Dr. M. M. Pallam Raju, Hon'ble Minister for Human Resource Development, Government of India, in the afternoon on 9th March, 2013.
IU-ATC aims to develop next generation wireless technologies tailored to the Indian needs. This consortium is simultaneously developing low-cost applications using wireless networks to serve the needs of the masses, especially in rural India. The main purpose of the workshop this year is to reflect on the research work done to date since the last workshop at Cambridge University, UK; and, to take on board further recommendations from funding agencies, which include the Department of Science and Technology-DST (India) and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council-EPSRC (UK).
IU-ATC is by far the largest consortium for collaborative research between UK and India including nearly 200 researchers (students, faculty, postdocs, and industry researchers) from India and UK. This consortium has helped create a network of Indian and UK scientists of a magnitude that did not exist up to now. The IU-ATC is the first large multi-institution, cross-continent project involving academia in India and UK coupled with active industry participation. Currently, the consortium comprises of nine leading research universities in UK, six IITs and the IISc, R&D organisations and major industrial partners in UK and India, and a number of small and medium enterprises.
From the U.K. side, the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland is the lead institution in IU-ATC. Eight other research-based UK universities form a part of IU-ATC: University of Surrey, Lancaster University, Queen Mary University of London, Southampton University, University of St. Andrews, University College London, University of Bristol, and the University of Cambridge. From the Indian side, IIT Madras is the lead institution and it is joined by five other IITs (IIT Delhi, IIT Bombay, IIT Mandi, IIT Kanpur, and IIT Hyderabad), IISc Bangalore and two R&D organisations IIT-M's RTBI and CeWIT. Companies in the consortium include: BT, Toshiba, Infosys, Wipro, and Sasken among others. The consortium is headed by Prof. Gerard Parr, University of Ulster and Prof. Ashok Jhunjhunwala, IIT Madras.
The IU-ATC aims to provide a holistic approach to next generation wireless networking technologies, from the physical layer to the network protocols, and applications on such networks that are relevant especially to rural India. With this focus, current research in IU-ATC is divided into three high-level areas: Applications and Services; Core Network Systems and Protocols; and, Heterogeneous Wireless Access Networks.
These three research areas within IU-ATC are focused on promoting a "digital economy" that aims to support research and skilled people to effect early adoption of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) by a variety of user sectors. The IU-ATC research areas are not standalone, but rather they encourage inter-area exchange and sharing of deliverables. This ensures that research test-beds provided by academic and industry partners are coordinated and managed to provide the maximum benefit for the individual research areas and for the project as a whole.
Some socially relevant projects under IU-ATC include E-Agri, E-Health, E-Education, and Emergency Services. The E-Agri project aims to develop technologies that will help connect farmers with experts who would be providing them with much needed farming information. This project also provides experts the tools by which they can quickly and easily search for the latest and relevant information. E-Health involves developing a computer-to-patient voice communication over low-end mobile phones for follow-up after initial treatment. E-Education involves developing a "virtual classroom for education." The Emergency Services deals with developing an end-to-end system to manage effective delivery of services in case of flood, fire, and other emergencies. These applications are currently being developed at the IIT Madras' Rural Technology and Business Incubator (RTBI). Some of these applications will be deployed in Himachal Pradesh in the coming months by IIT Mandi. An over-arching activity will explore and develop technical solutions to provide scalable wireless and fixed access to Cloud-Computing resources in support of these applications. The whole area of Cloud Applications and Services is important across both the Indian and British governments.
Furthermore, the IU-ATC consortium provides excellent opportunities for training young and senior academicians and research scholars to work in multinational research teams. The consortium has a number of young faculty, post-doctoral fellows, and graduate students from leading institutions in India and UK, who work under the guidance and support of their senior mentors.
IU-ATC is funded equally by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) in India and EPSRC in UK. The industry partners fund their own participation. The 1st phase ran from 2009-2012. For the 2nd phase from 2013-15, DST has committed funding of about Rs. 20 crores for the Indian side, with the UK side receiving a matching amount from EPSRC.
Beyond the current research areas, the IU-ATC will develop initiatives to attract funding from strategic industry partners and the UK and India governments to become an international Centre of Excellence in ICT Research and Technology Transfer that covers all layers of the communications stack. For this purpose, the IU-ATC will provide an internationally leading resource of expertise and infrastructure to develop, at low financial risk and exposure, the research capacity of indigenous Indian companies in the ICT Engineering and Software sector. IU-ATC will also play a leading role in establishing competitive technology and knowledge transfer between the UK and India in the ICT domain over the next 10 years.
Keeping up with the tradition, Exodia-2013, Tech-cum-Cult fest organized by the students of IIT Mandi from March 1st-March3rd was a big hit with the audience this year too. Around 550 students took part in the fest from the reputed technical institutes from all over India like IIT Kanpur, IIT Ropar, IIIT Hyderabad, BITs Goa and so on. The fest was a right mix of cultural, technical and literary events. The band of ex-euphoria member, EKA; Kathak performance by Monisa Nayak, Mr and Ms. Exodia and musical show by you tube artistes were some of the highlights of the fest.
It was a sheer treat to watch the cultural show organized during Exodia that included Band Slam, Alap, Instrumania, Big Stink, Envision (Documentary-making contest) , Synchronians (group dance), Groove fanatics (solo dance) and so on. In Brand Slam musical bands from different parts of the country participated where as Alap was a solo singing contest which attracted around 30 participants. Instrumania gave an opportunity to the students to exhibit their talent in playing musical instruments like guitar,flute,table,dhol and so on.
Various literary events like: The Big Question, Survivor, Biggest Liar and Devil's advocate very well exhibited students' speaking and argumentative prowess. The participants put their arguments logically with apt choice of words.
Several technical events like Contirve, Junkyard Wars, Designots, Pneumatic Missile, Dementia, Obfuscation, Quick Thesis Contest, Clash of Avatars (Sumo), Escalade and NitroBlaze as part of Exodia helped the creative minds to innovate and design running models.
IIT Mandi celebrated its fourth Foundation Day on February 24, 2013. The day was commemorated with various sports events, cultural activities, and award ceremony for students, staff and faculty and a Dham (traditional Mandi food) for all.
On the occasion, the Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, recounted the accomplishments of IIT Mandi in the short span of four years which included being the first new IIT to have academic, research and residential facilities on its permanent campus at Kamand. He added that the linear model of developing IIT Mandi's Kamand campus in the green, rustic and remote river valley of Uhl is apt. The chief guest on the occasion, Prof. H. Schweppe, Visiting Professor IIT Mandi, distributed the certificates and trophies to students, staff and faculty members as recognition of their exemplary performances.
Students, staff and faculty members actively participated in sports like volleyball matches and tug-of-war. B.Tech.students presented a dance and staged a small play on the role of society in fighting AIDS.
A three-day workshop on "Aspects of Professional Leadership" was conducted by Dr. Chinmoy Sarkar at IIT Mandi as part of HSS programme from February 20 to 22, 2013. About 60 students from various disciplines and batches attended the workshop.
The workshop focused on the methodology to use one's previous experience to develop new products or services as a leader and hence, conceptualize their thoughts to reach the undiscovered destination thereby attaining success. According to Dr. Chinmoy Sarkar, "The destination could be reached mainly by innovating and collaborating." He also discussed his model named "AXELL" which stands for "Access Excellence" and focuses on gaining insight from the previous experience to develop a prototype, reinventing the thought-out product by innovating as well as collaborating in a step-by-step mode.
By the end of the workshop, students were divided into 12 teams and they presented their self-developed plans/ existing innovations by correlating it to the 3-Dimensional "AXELL" Model. Students found the workshop enlightening as it helped them think beyond the conservative base and tread the path to innovation as leaders.
The School of Engineering, IIT Mandi, from February 4, 2013, organized a short-term course of one week on Computer Aided Drafting for Engineers and Designers. The course drew 32 candidates from organizations like DRDO, Irrigation & Public Health Department, as well as the industry and the academia.
Prof. Kenneth Gonsalves, Prof. B. K. Mishra, Dr. Pradeep Parameswaran and Dr. Vishal S. Chauhan inaugurated the course in the academic block of IIT Mandi.
In the inaugural speech, Dr Pradeep parameswaran informed the participants about the Institute's vision and achievements. Next, Prof. Ken Gonsalves, visiting professor at IIT Mandi, spoke about the research development activities in nano/microfabrication for electronics as well as in bio-nanotechnology, and that IIT Mandi would be among the few IITs to have a cleanroom facility.
Prof. B.K. Mishra from IIT Roorkee underlined the importance of Computer Aided Drafting in the field of engineering and design. He then introduced the participants to the basic fundamentals of drafting and designing.
The short-term course covered part modeling, assembly modeling and computer aided engineering drawing in various field of engineering (i.e. mechanical, civil, chemical, electrical, electronics and architecture).
The participants found the course very effective and appreciated the instructors' helpful attitude. The speakers inculded Prof. Sunil R. Kale ( IIT Delhi), Prof. B. K. Mishra (IIT Roorkee), Dr. Rajeev Kumar (IIT Mandi), Dr. Vishal Singh Chauhan (IIT Mandi), Dr. Om Praksh Singh (IIT Mandi). Ar. Nitin Gautam (Build Con Pvt Ltd New Delhi) and Er. Sushil Suril ( SolidWorks corporation New Delhi).
The course concluded with certificate distribution by the Director of IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves. While addressing the participants, he said, "Short-term courses are means to expose the audience to the wide range of applications in the area and about different methodologies to tackle real life problems". Dr. Rajeev Kumar and Dr. Vishal Singh Chauhan were the coordinator and co-coordinator respectively of this short-term course.
IIT Mandi celebrated the 64th Republic Day function with patriotic fervour and traditional gaiety in front of the Academic Block in Mandi and on the main campus at Kamand.
It was for the first time that the R-Day function was organised on its permanent campus at Kamand. On the occasion, the guest of honour, Mrs. Priscilla Gonsalves, hoisted the National Tricolour and took salute by the security personnel in the presence of faculty members, staff and M.S., Ph.D. and B.Tech. students.
The Tricolour was also unfurled in the Academic Block of the transit campus in Mandi by Prof. Lalit Malhotra in the presence of the Deputy Registrar, Mrs Lalita Sharma, faculty members and staff. On the occasion, he said, "The Republic Day should not be observed as a mere ritual but everyone should take an oath to accomplish their work with perfection to realise their dream of a progressive and developed India."
The event left everyone with the strong determination to excel in their respective fields for the welfare of the nation.
The first batch of students of IIT Mandi, graduating in June 2013, has reasons to cheer as companies have already recruited 43 students.
In the first and second round, 25 B.Tech.students of the Computer Science branch, 14 of Electrical Engineering and two of Mechanical Engineering have received placement offers. IT giant Microsoft has offered a package of Rs. 16.2 lakh each to Raj Kamal Singh, Samrat Gavale and Sumeet Singh Arora.
Two MS students, Sujeet Kumar and Srimanta Mandal, have bagged job offers from Samsung. The MS is a unique research-oriented Masters degree programme. Spending 2-3 years in an individually-designed programme, each graduate does a substantial thesis that advances the state-of-the-art. This enables them to take on challenging design assignments in industry. Some MS graduates continue for a PhD to prepare for a career in research and teaching. Dr.Arti Kashyap, the faculty advisor of the Career & Placement Cell of IIT, said that so far Microsoft, CISCO, Google, Samsung, Infosys, Cognizant, Finisar and Nucleus have visited the campus. More companies are coming in the next round that starts in the last week of February. The Institute expects that most students will have jobs offers in hand soon.
The Director of IIT Mandi, Prof. Timothy Gonsalves, said that good opportunities were coming for the first batch of students and companies were coming to Mandi inspite of the remote location. He hoped that at least a few students of the first batch will start their own companies. Rather than competing for jobs in established companies, such entrepreneurs will provide jobs for others.
IIT Mandi is now first among the new IITs to have academic and residential facilities on its main campus at Kamand. In a historic move, 108 B.Tech IInd yr students shifted to their new hostels on September 23, 2012. The Dining Hall was formally inaugurated by the warden of the Hostel, Dr. Venkat Krishnan in the presence of the Director, faculty, staff and students. A table tennis room inside the building and the kitchen were also inaugurated next by students, Apoorva Bhatia, Runa Barik, Reena Singh and Chamundeswar. The inauguration was followed by the first lunch prepared in the kitchen of the new hostel. The classes of this batch are now taking place in the newly setup class-rooms and laboratories on the main campus itself.
A one week short term course on 'Finite Element Method for Engineering Applications' organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi during July 16-20, 2012. Short term course was inaugurated by Prof. T. A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Subrata Ray, Prof. Lalit Malhotra , Dr. R. C. Sawhney and Dr. Manish Shrikhande in academic block of IIT Mandi.
A five-day Seminar on "Computational Intelligence Applications to Renewable Energy" organized by Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) during July 09-13, 2012.The Seminar was inaugurated by Prof. Lalit Malhotra, acting director of IIT Mandi, Prof. Subrata Ray and Prof. B. Subramanian in academic block of IIT Mandi.
With the publication of "The Institutes of Technology (Amendment) Act, 2012 (No. 34 of 2012)" dated June20, 2012 in the Gazette of India, and Notified on June 29, 2012, the Parliament has declared IIT Mandi to be one of the IITs under the "Institutes of Technology Act, 1961". From 29 June 2012, this Amendment not only puts IIT Mandi legally on par with the older IITs but also invests IIT Mandi with the legal authority to award degrees.
The 12-member NPTEL Programme Implementation Committee (PIC) met at IIT Mandi on June 29, 2012. The participants discussed ways to enhance effectiveness of NPTEL's free online courses which aim at improving the quality of engineering education in the country.
On June 26th, IIT Mandi Director Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves shifted to Kamand, 15 kms from the transit campus in Mandi city. After the ribbon-cutting ceremony by Mrs Priscilla Gonsalves, the IIT Mandi Director occupied his office in the renovated Hospital of the Animal Husbandry Department. As the building now has the conveniences of modern life, his first act was to send an email via the 100 Mb/s optical fibre connection to the Internet.
Professor Gonsalves, his wife Mrs Priscilla Gonsalves, their dog Rusty and a PhD scholar Reena Singh are among those who have shifted to the beautiful and serene campus at Kamand. They are residing in renovated staff quarters overlooking the Uhl River. The shift is definitely a step towards speeding up of ongoing activities at the new campus. The second-year B.Tech. students would be the next to move to the Kamand campus in the forthcoming academic session starting in August 2012.
The Director has set an example by being the first one to shift, which will motivate other faculty and staff to join him at the Kamand campus soon. The entire Institute is expected to operate from Kamand by July 2013.
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mandi in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) organized the first Industry - Academia Conclave on Saturday, 5 May 2012 at the Kamand Campus of IIT Mandi.
The article titled, A novel quantum critical phase in heavy electron metals by A. Taraphder (IIT Mandi) and M S Laad (RWTH Aachen) has been selected as a 'highlighted' article by the editors in Journal of Physics, Condensed mMatter (IOP publishing). http://iopscience.iop.org/0953-8984/labtalk-article/49631
Beginning March 30, 2012 2nd year B. Tech. students of IIT Mandi have started working in the Mechanical Engineering workshop at the Kamand campus. The workshop has a variety of machines including CNC lathe machines, CNC milling machines, power hacksaw, pillar drill, bench grinding machine, spot welding machine, gas and arc welding equipment, sheet shearing machines, etc. It has an assortment of hand and foundry tools. 2nd B Tech students are using these facilities to fabricate products for their Design Practicum projects.
On April 13, 2012 Director, IIT Mandi, Prof. Gonsalves performed the ground-breaking ceremony at the Kamand campus in the presence of various faculty members and the administrative staff. The ceremony organised by M/s Ahluwalia Corporation began with a havan, followed by the ground breaking and a high tea. CPWD has formally awarded the contract to M/s Ahluwalia Contracts (India) Ltd. Mr. Saini, Vice President of Ahluwalia Contarcts promised that the first few buildings of the South Campus will be ready by July. They expect to have up to 250 workers on the job at peak times. .
IIT Mandi celebrated its 3rd Foundation day on February 24, 2012 at the upcoming Kamand campus. The Director, Prof. T. A. Gonsalves highlighted the important achievements of the fast growing Institute. These include, but are not limited to, theoretical and experimental research publications by the young faculty, project fundings from DIT and DST, appreciation of research work benefiting local people and industry, strengthening of the already vibrant teaching community with more faculty members, as well as the supporting administrative staff. Infrastructure is being developed on Kamand campus at a rapid pace beginning with setting up of various workshops. The students of IIT Mandi have made their strong presence felt in various inter-IIT activities, be it sports or other cultural events.
Students of IIT Mandi presented an exciting mix of cultural programs during the celebrations. A major highlight of the day was the song and dance presentation by primary school students of the local school. The registrar Dr. Sawhney presided over the awards distribution ceremony where Mrs. Gonsalves presented various awards and certificates to students, faculty and administrative staff.
A five member team from Microsoft India visited IIT Mandi to select students for their Summer Internship programme. Mr. Mahender Dubba, Senior Director, Service Management Division of Microsoft expressed his pleasure in interviewing the students for this programme. He mentioned that despite IIT Mandi being in its third year only, there is no difference between the students of IIT Mandi and those from the older IITs. Selecting three students for the programme, he expressed his pleasure that the students have been given all the required exposure and rigorous training here.
Professor T. A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, told Mr. Dubba that IIT Mandi would be happy to work on long term innovative projects with Microsoft. He also wished that Microsoft would expand its talent search beyond computer science students and think of looking for talents in other streams like electrical and mechanical engineering. Pleased with the talent, Mr Dubba expressed his desire to be the first recruiter at IIT Mandi.
About Microsoft India, Mr. Dubba said that the campus at Hyderabad is the largest in terms of people and business that Microsoft has in any place outside the United States.Click here for a news report in The Tribune.
In late 2010, we received our first donation to the IIT Mandi Corpus Fund.This was from an alumnus of IIT Madras, who has given another donation in 2011. The Corpus Fund has already grown to Rs. 4 lakhs. We invite IIT alumni and others to donate generously. Your donation will go towards providing scholarships and amenities for students, supporting research by faculty etc. You may give a general donation to the Corpus Fund, or earmark it for a specific purpose such as a Chair Professorship.
To donate to IIT, please contact the Director, Prof. T A Gonsalves at director[at]iitmandi[dot]ac[dot]in or +91-1905-237949.
Ms. Bettina Knopp is visiting IIT for the February-May 2012 semester. This is aimed at strengthening the partnership that IIT Mandi is forging with the TU9 in Germany
The Indian Institute of Technology Mandi will soon have a world class bio/nano-technology experimental facility. Basic synthesis and characterisation equipment is already in place. By mid-2012, the facility will have an NMR and a TEM. Other sophisticated instruments will follow thereafter. A team of nearly 10 young faculty and over 10 research scholars will use the facility under the guidance of the Visiting Distinguished Professor, Prof. Kenneth Gonsalves (the Celanese Acetate Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte). The research focus will be on the development of low-cost organic photovoltaic material, organic LEDs, nano-pharmaceuticals, micro-fabrication for electronics and bio/nano-technology.
On 1st February, the Director Prof. T.A. Gonsalves and Prof. Ken Gonsalves met the Himachal Chief Minister Prof. Prem Kumar Dhumal to apprise him of the progress and plans of IIT. The CM assured all support. Click here for a news report in The Tribune.
The proliferation of the Internet and Telecom has brought a new dimension to information access. This has enabled what is today known as ubiquitous computing. Laptops, palmtops and cellphones are enabled with Internet access, enabling immediate access to any information across the globe, anywhere and at anytime.
"Hot springs will soon become a brave new hope for the Rs 3,000-crore ageing apple industry as the Indian Institute of Technolgy (IIT) is on its way to develop apple cold stores and fruit processing using this cheap sustainable source.
This cutting edge research has attracted none other than the country's great nuclear scientist and former President of the country Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam recently while he was interacting with young researchers," The Tribune.
Click here for more details.
Prof. Ken Gonsalves,eminent expert in materials and chemistry from the University of North Carolina, has joined IIT Mandi as Visiting Distinguished Professor initially for 6 months.
Dr. Sarita Azad, School of Basic Sciences, has been awarded the President's award-2011 for excellence at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), New Delhi. The award was conferred by Honorable Defence Minister Shri A.K. Anthony.
Prof. Ressel, Rektor, University of Stuttgart, Germany on behalf of TU9, Germany and Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, India signed an MoU for collaboration
Report of the Committee appointed by MHRD to recommend autonomy measures to facilitate IITs scaling greater heights.
Dr. Pradeep Parameswaran has been selected as one of the guest editors for a special issue on Nano catalysis of the International Journal of Chemical Engineering.
Students residing at Boys Hostel-2 ,celebrated the first hostel day at IIT Mandi on 27th of March 2011...
Academic and Research Collaboration between Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, Mandi and Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai,India.
A three-day international conference on "Advance Computing and Communication" was held on 8thApril,2011 at the National Institute of Technology (NIT) Hamirpur campus .
International Women's Day Celebration
Prof. Timothy A Gonsalves had a very cordial meeting with the Hon'ble Chief Minister.
IIT Mandi completed two years of its existence on 24th February 2011.
Animal Husbandry portion of the Kamand campus.
IITMandi proudly celebrated the 62nd Republic Day with traditional fervour.
Golden Jubilee Award for Professor Lalit Kumar Malhotra ....
Cleanliness Drive on 26 January 2010 ....
Joint working group to help farmers ....
Book Nook, the recreational library at IIT Mandi ....
A blood donation camp was organized on 1st October by NSS, IIT Mandi ....
"A Midsummer Night's Dream", a play by shakespeare was performed by....
Central Library was inaugrated by Prof. T.A. Gonsalves Director IIT Mandi...
Dr. R.C. Sawhney has been appointed as the Public Information Officer of IIT Mandi...
Indian Institute Of Technology Mandi celebrated Independence Day in its campus at Mandi. On this occasion...
Various newspapers covered the shifting of the institute from its mentor IIT Roorkee to Mandi...
Dr. R.C. Sawhney retired recently as Director, Life Sciences, DRDO Headquarters and is a native of Shimla.
Dr. Shib Nath Jha has worked at IIT Bombay for over 30 years and he has worked on deputation at IIT Indore and IIT Gandhinagar..........
Dr. G. Haobijam is an alumni of IIT Guwahati and belongs to Manipur..........
Dr. Aniruddha Chakraborty hails from Kolkata. He did his PhD from..........
Er. Rajat joined us as the J.E.(civil).......
IIT Mandi organised a Cult-cum-Tech Event during 22nd to 24th April in the premesis of Rajendra Bhawan.......
IIT Mandi has launched its first ever wall magazine by the name of "Azure".
Badminton, Lawn tennis and table tennis were the teams that.......
Road to Rutas was the first technical festival of IIT Indore. It was a techno-management industry simulation.......
IIT Mandi celebrated its 1st foundation day on 24th February, at their permanent campus in Mandi.
A four day trip was organised on the occasion of 1st foundation day of IIT Mandi.
In its 1st year, IIT Mandi participated in the 42nd Inter IIT Sports meet held at .....