National Institute of Technology Calicut

National Institute of Technology Calicut
ദേശീയ സാങ്കേതിക വിദ്യാപീഠം, കോഴിക്കോട്
Motto Malayalam: തമസോമാ ജ്യോതിര്ഗമയ
Sanskrit: तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय
Motto in English
 From Darkness, Lead us unto Light
Type Public
Established 1961
Chairman Aruna Jayanthi[1]
Director Dr. Sivaji Chakravorti [2]
Academic staff
 205
Undergraduates 4200
Postgraduates 1100
Location Kozhikode, Kerala, India
11°19′19″N 75°56′07″E / 11.321973°N 75.935386°E / 11.321973; 75.935386Coordinates: 11°19′19″N 75°56′07″E / 11.321973°N 75.935386°E / 11.321973; 75.935386
Campus 300 acres (1.2 km2), rural/semi-urban
Website www.nitc.ac.in

National Institute of Technology Calicut (NITC), formerly the Calicut Regional Engineering College (CREC), is a federally funded technical university and an institute of national importance governed by an act passed by the Parliament of India. The campus is situated near Chathamangalam, 22 kilometres (14 mi) north east of Kozhikode, on the Kozhikode–Mukkam Road.[3] It was established in 1961 and was known as Calicut Regional Engineering College (CREC) until 2002. It is one of the National Institutes of Technology established by the Government of India for imparting high standard technical education to students from all over the country. The college is among the very few institutions in the country to host a supercomputer of its own,[4] and amongst the pioneers in the country to have a dedicated nanotechnology department.[5]

History

Initial years

The Administrative Block

National Institute of Technology, Calicut was set up in 1961 as Regional Engineering College Calicut (CREC), the ninth of its kind and the first one to be established during the Third Five-Year Plan period. Until the formation of Calicut University in 1963, the institute was affiliated with Kerala University. It was largely due to the efforts of Pattom Thanu Pillai, then Chief Minister of Kerala, that the institute came into being. Prof. S. Rajaraman, first principal of Government Engineering College, Thrissur was appointed as the special officer in 1961 to organise the activities of the college until M. V. Kesava Rao took charge as the first principal of the college. The classes were initially held at the Government Polytechnic at West Hill, before it moved to its present campus in 1963. The college started with an annual intake of 125 students for the undergraduate courses, on a campus of 120 hectares (1.2 km2).

Expansion

Bhaskara Lecture Hall

The intake for the undergraduate courses was increased to 250 in 1966, 150 for the first year and 100 for the preparatory course. The annual intake was reduced from 250 to 200 from the year 1968–69 on account of industrial recession.

After Prof S. Unnikrishnan Pillai took charge as principal in 1983, the Training and Placement Department was started to organise campus recruitments for students. The college moved into the area of information technology in 1984 with the commissioning of multi-user PSI Omni system and HCL workhorse PCs. In 1987 the college celebrated 25 years of its existence, and postgraduate courses were started. The CEDTI was established on the campus the following year.

In 1990 Shankar Dayal Sharma inaugurated the Architecture Department Block and construction of a computer centre was completed. In 1996, the institute website (the first in Kerala) was launched. The Indian Institute of Management Calicut functioned from the NIT campus in its first few years of existence before moving to its new campus in Kunnamangalam in 2003.

Recent developments

The Electronic Lecture Hall Complex

The Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India, accorded NIT status to REC Calicut in June 2002 granting it academic and administrative autonomy. It was a lead institute under the World Bank-funded Technical Education Quality Improvement Program (TEQIP) which began in 2002. In 2003, students were first admitted to the flagship undergraduate B.Tech through the All India Engineering Entrance Exam. With the passing of the National Institutes of Technology Act in May 2007, NIT Calicut was declared an Institute of National Importance.[6] The National Institutes of Technology Act is the second legislation for technical education institutions after the Indian Institutes of Technology Act of 1961. In 2007 NIT Calicut raised its annual intake for its undergraduate program to 570.[7] The annual intake for undergraduate program was increased to 1049 by 2011.[8]

Academic departments

Engineering departments

Science departments

Department of Physics at NIT Calicut

Schools

Allied department

Courses

Undergraduate course offered by NITC include Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) in various engineering fields and Bachelor of Architecture (B.Arch.). These are paralleled by postgraduate courses offering Master of Technology (M.Tech). In addition, NITC offers an applied computer science course granting Master of Computer Application (M.C.A.), a business course granting Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) and a two-year Master of Science (M.Sc.) in science departments. PhD programmes are available in all engineering and science disciplines and management.

School of Nanoscience & Technology

The School of Nanoscience and Technology offers higher degree programs at the Post-graduate and Doctoral levels, in various academic streams related to nanoscience and nanotechnology. The school is involved in sponsored research projects from various funding agencies. The faculty, students and research scholars are involved in dedicated learning and research to explore, understand and improve materials and processes from a fundamental perspective. They pursue academic research leading to the mission to introduce new functionalities into existing materials, and to tailor-make materials with exceptional qualities, which are the two major goals of nanoscience and nanotechnology. The varied interests of the school include study of nanoscale physical phenomena, experimental research in nanoscale flow and heat transfer, nanomaterials and composites, bio-nanotechnology and targeted drug delivery systems, optical measurements, combustion and nanoparticle fuel additives, synthesis of nanomaterials including carbon nanotubes, and discrete computational studies on nanoscale systems using molecular dynamics simulations. The strong research vibe in the school is also sustained by numerous sophisticated equipments that it houses, ranging from characterisation instruments to even electron microscopes.[5]

School of Management Studies

The School of Management Studies offers a two-year Master of Business Administration (MBA) program exclusively for graduates in Engineering. From 2013 onwards, the school admits students from different graduation streams having mathematics as one area of study. The school also offers PhD program in management. Admission to the MBA program is based on CAT score, performance in group discussion and personal interviews. This general MBA program offers electives in the streams – finance, human resource management, operations management, business analytics and systems, marketing, strategic management, etc.

The program was initiated in 2008 and the first batch of students enrolled in 2009.

IT Finishing School

The Union Ministry of Human Resource Development, has started IT finishing schools at NIT Calicut and seven other national institutions: the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee, and the National Institutes of Technology (NITs) at Durgapur, Kurushetra, Jaipur, Surathkal, Trichy and Warangal. This school is supportd by NASSCOM and some of the major IT companies in India.[9]

International Liaison Office

The institute has set up an International Liaison Office to follow up the MoUs (Memorandum of Understanding) signed between NITC and other institutions in the world. It also guides current students from abroad and those interested in joining the institute. In 2011, a MoU was signed between NITC and Auburn University (USA) for research in Photonics.[10] A MoU was also signed with NITK Suratkal for academic and research collaborations.[11] NITC is also the mentoring institute of NIT Sikkim.

International conferences and symposiums

For two consecutive years, 2010 and 2011, NIT Calicut organised the Indo-US Symposium on Biocomputing.[12] The symposium was organised jointly by the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and the School of Biotechnology, and was held at the Taj Gateway in Calicut. It was jointly funded by the Department of Bio-Technology (India) and the National Science Foundation (USA).[13] The symposium consisted of a series of talks by leading researchers from India and the US in the area of biocomputing.

Embarking on novel research domain of light-matter interaction, and fostering interaction amongst researchers in the field of Light, the Department of Physics at NIT Calicut hosted an International Conference on Light: Optics '14. The conference conducted during 19–21 March 2014, witnessed research works from numerous institutes within the nation and abroad. Gold medals were awarded to the best papers, while some selected papers were reviewed and published in American Institute of Physics (AIP) Proceedings.[14]

NIT Calicut hosted TEDx NIT Calicut on 14 January 2012, which was an independently organised TED event, consisting of talks, video and interactive sessions with high-achieving entrepreneurs, innovators, performers, and industry leaders.[15]

Rankings

NIT Calicut has been ranked as the 35th best Engineering College of India in the Edu-Rand Rankings of 2015.[16] The survey was done jointly by Edu, an Indian company and Rand Corporation, a non-profit American thinktank.[17]

Facilities

Hostels

Ladies' Hostel

NITC is a fully residential institution with 13 hostels on the campus to accommodate students. There are around 4500 students in NITC hostels. There are 12 Men's hostels, named by letters A, B, C, D, E, F, F', G, PG I, PG II, IH and newly formed Mega Hostel. Professor's Apartments (FB) are also rented out due to shortage of hostel facilities. The shortage of hostels is expected to improve after the Mega Hostels are fully constructed and operational. The 4 Ladies' hostels (LH): A, B, C and Mega Ladies Hostels have triple rooms.

A and PG I hostels accommodate I year B.Tech students. II year B.Tech students are accommodated in the Mega Hostel. III year B.Tech students are accommodated in B and C hostels. Final year B.Tech students are accommodated in D, E, F, G and PG-II hostels. M.Tech. and MCA students reside in apartments.

The older men's hostels are close to the academic area, while the IH, Mega Hostels, ladies' hostels and Professor's Apartments are in the residential campus. A mini-canteen is available in the hostel premises.

Students are permitted to use their own computers in their rooms. All hostels apart from A and PG-1 are well connected through a 100 Mbit/s LAN network to the Campus Networking Center through which internet connectivity is provided for free. Each hostel contains a common room with cable TV, daily newspaper and indoor games facilities.

Each hostel has its own mess and students are allowed to join the mess of any hostel, with the exception of A and PG I which are exclusive for first year students. The type of food served in the hostel messes is as follows:

Two cosmopolitan messes are available in the ladies hostel premises. Other facilities like mini-canteen, indoor shuttle court, gymnasium and an extension of the Co-operative Society store are available in the ladies' hostel.

Sports

NITC has a gymnasium, swimming pool, an open-air theatre, an auditorium and facilities for outdoor sports like tennis, football, volleyball, badminton, roller skating, hockey and basketball. It also has a cricket ground where Ranji Trophy matches have been played.[18]

Central Computer Center

The Central Computer Center

The Central Computer Center[19] is a central computing facility which caters to the computing requirements of the whole community of this institution. The working hours of this centre is on round the clock on all working days except Republic Day, Independence Day, Thiruvonam, Vijayadashami, Gandhi Jayanthi, Bakrid and Christmas.

The centre is equipped with three IBM X-series servers, one Dell PowerEdge 6600 Quad Processor Xeon Server, six Dell PowerEdge 2600 dual processor server and one Sunfire V210 Server. The desktops and thin clients are connected to the servers through gigabit switches and CAT6 UTP cables. The centre is connected to the campus-networking centre with backbone of 32Mbit/s through a Nortel L3 switch and in turn to the internet.

Central Library

NITC's Central Library, with more than 100,000 books, is one of the largest technical libraries in India. It subscribes to more than 200 print journals. The institute has a digital library, Nalanda (Network of Automated Library and Archives), which houses online resources. Users of the institute and networked institutions can access around 17,000 journals, proceedings, databases, electronic theses, dissertations and online courses at Nalanda. It is part of the Indest consortium, which networks the libraries at technical institutions in India.

NIT Calicut's supercomputer, Purna (Parallel Universal Remote Numerical Analyser), is accessible from anywhere in the campus and is provided for the use of all students and faculty members. PURNA has a peak speed of 1.5 teraflops.[4]

Technology Business Incubator

The Technology Business Incubator (TBI) at NIT Calicut was set up with the help of the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India and the National Science and Technology Entrepreneurship Development Board (NSTEDB). Its objective is to help the development of start-up ventures in electronics and IT.TBI provide workspace with shared office facilities with emphasis on business and professional services necessary for nurturing and supporting early stage growth of technology and technology based enterprises.[20][21]

Culture and student life

NIT Calicut holds two major annual events, the techno-management festival Tathva, held in the monsoon semester and the cultural festival Ragam, which is held in the winter semester.

Tathva

Main article: Tathva

Tathva is the annual techno-management fest organised by the college. It is usually held during the month of September and lasts for four days. Tathva has come to be regarded as one among the biggest technical festivals of South India. It has been held every year since its inception in 2001. Aimed at inspiring innovation and technical interest among students and the public, Tathva has played host to lectures, seminars, workshops by companies like ParaMek Technologies, competitions, paper presentations, exhibitions, quizzes, model displays and robotics events. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, G. Madhavan Nair, Harold Kroto, Johannes Orphal, Jimmy Wales, and Suhas Gopinath, were some of the eminent guests in previous editions of Tathva.

Ragam

Open Air Theater
Main article: Ragam (festival)

Ragam is the cultural festival of NITC. Colleges and universities from Kerala and outside compete in events like trivia quizzes, dance competitions, rock shows and music concerts. Some of the performers who have performed in previous years include Shaan, Sunidhi Chauhan, Blaaze, Shankar Mahadevan, Kartik, Benny Dayal, Stephen Devassy and Parikrama. Breathe Floyd, a Pink Floyd tribute band from the UK, performed during Ragam 2009. Ragam 2010 featured KK, Naresh Iyer and Higher on Maiden, a tribute band to Iron Maiden. Ragam is held in the memory of former student P. Rajan who died after being held (ostensibly for being a Naxalite) in police custody.[22]

Student organisations

The student organisations at NITC include Robotics Interest Group (RIG), the Literary and Debating Club (LND), The Indian Cultural Association (ICA), the Forum for Dance and Dramatics(DND), Civil Engineering Association (CEA),[23] Electronics and Communication Engineering Association (ECEA), Electrical Engineering Association (EEA),[24] Computer Science & Engineering Association (CSEA),[25] Chemical Engineering Association (CHEA) which is the NITC Chapter of IIChE, Mechanical Engineering Association, Enquire (the NITC Quiz Club), The Music Club, Club Mathematica, Audio Visual Club (AVC), Team Unwired (Engineering and Technology Club), Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) student chapter, the Indian Society for Technical Education (ISTE) Students' Chapter,[26] The Industrial and Planning Forum (IPF), the Nature Club, Adventure Club (Ad-Club), and the Robotics Interest Group (Engineering and Technology).

Professional bodies with student chapters include NIT Calicut ACM Student Chapter,[27] Computer Society of India, the Indian Society for Technical Education, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the Institution of Engineers (India).

Admissions

Students are taken in for the undergraduate courses through the Joint Entrance Examination Main (JEE Main) conducted by CBSE, New Delhi. Around 16 lakh students wrote this test in 2012 to gain admission to one of 20 NITs. This makes it one of the largest such examinations in the world.[28] Admission to some other autonomous national level technical institutes (called Deemed University) is also through JEE Main. Students who have studied outside India for a minimum period of 2(two) years may seek admission through DASA (Direct Admission for Students Abroad) which was managed by EdCil (Educational Consultants India Limited) and is currently being managed by National Institute of Technology Karnataka, Suratkal (NIT-K) based on 12th Standard Board Examination marks or equivalent higher secondary examination marks/grade and SAT-II (Scholastic Aptitude Test -II) scores in Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics conducted by College Board. Similar admission provision is provided for foreign nationals.

Admission to the graduate M.Tech and PhD courses are primarily based on scores in the GATE exam, conducted by the IITs. Admission to the MCA programme is done through the NIMCET conducted by the NITs. The first NIMCET in 2006 was conducted by NIT Calicut. Faculty from other institutes work as research scholars in NITC under the Quality Improvement Programme (QIP). It is the national coordination centre for the QIP of polytechnic institutes.

Admission to MBA course is based on the Common Admission Test[CAT] score. Admission details will be published in the institute website and major dailies in India. The applicants will be shortlisted based on the CAT score, performance in qualifying degree (BTech/BE), work experience etc. The final selection is based on the performance of shortlisted candidates in group discussion (GD) and personal interview (PI). The GD and PI are normally conducted at major cities across India.

Administration

Under the constitution of the National Institutes of Technology Act 2007, the President of India is the Visitor to the institute. The authorities of the institute are Board of Governors and the Senate. The Board is headed by the chairman, who is appointed by the Visitor. The Director, who is the secretary of the Board, looks after the day-to-day running of the institute. The Board of Governors has nominees of the Central Government, the State Government, the NIT Council and the Institute Senate.

NITC people

Chairpersons

Notable alumni

See also

National Institute of Technology, Puducherry

References

  1. ↑ http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/45017470.cms?_ga=1.30501759.1187215826.1415001879
  2. ↑ Administration - NIT Calicut
  3. ↑ LOCATION – National Institute of Technology Calicut
  4. 1 2 Super Computing Facility at NITC
  5. 1 2 http://nitc.ac.in/index.php/?url=department/index/27
  6. ↑ "National Institutes of Technology Bill" (PDF).
  7. ↑ Bablu, J.S. "Looking for the NIT Advantage", The Hindu, 19 June 2007. Accessed 10 July 2007.
  8. ↑ "NIT Calicut annual report 2011" (PDF): 2.
  9. ↑ "IT Finishing School". The Hindu (Chennai, India). 3 April 2007. Retrieved 2007-05-09.
  10. ↑ "MoU between NITC and Auburn" (PDF). NITC (Calicut, India). 14 September 2011. Retrieved 2012-01-02.
  11. ↑ "MoU between NITC and NITK" (PDF). NITC (Calicut, India). 14 September 2011. Retrieved 2012-01-02.
  12. ↑ "Indo-US Symposium at NIT Calicut". The Hindu (Calicut, India). 14 September 2011. Retrieved 2012-01-01.
  13. ↑ "NITC to hold Indo-US workshop on bio-computing". The Hindu (Calicut, India). 14 September 2011. Retrieved 2012-01-01.
  14. ↑ "AIP Proceedings - Light and Its Interaction with Matter". 16 October 2014.
  15. ↑ The Hindu:NIT-C to host TEDx event, The Hindu:NIT-C to host TEDx event
  16. ↑ "Best engineering colleges in India". digit.in.
  17. ↑ "Case Studies, Leaders, Policy, Administration, Industry Focus, Campus, Technology". www.edu-leaders.com.
  18. ↑ "Regional Engineering College Cricket Ground". Retrieved 2006-10-06.
  19. ↑ http://www.nitc.ac.in/index.php/?url=department/index/21. Missing or empty |title= (help) Central Computer Centre
  20. ↑ "Technology Business Incubators (TBIs) in India". Retrieved 2007-01-22.
  21. ↑ "Spinning success stories in entrepreneurship". Retrieved 2007-01-22.
  22. ↑ "Ragam at NIT Calicut". The Hindu (Chennai, India). 23 February 2006. Retrieved 2007-01-10.
  23. ↑ "CEA".
  24. ↑ "EEA".
  25. ↑ "CSEA".
  26. ↑ url=http://istenitc.co.nf/
  27. ↑ "NIT Calicut ACM Student Chapter". 21 September 2012.
  28. ↑ "All India Engineering Entrance Exam". The Hindu (Chennai, India). Retrieved 2007-01-22.
  29. ↑ , The Hindu (Kerala). Article dated September 16, 2006.
  30. ↑ Faculty biography, School of Management Studies, NIT. Accessed 9 September 2014.

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