A vast number of over 769 students have refused to join the IITs after gaining admission. There are legitimate fears that the brand value of the elite engineering colleges has taken a hit. Even general category seats are going vacant, forcing the authorities to opt for a second round of allotments. And the prime reason for so many students giving the IITs a miss is the tangible lack of confidence in the new IITs. As observed in 2008, eight new IITs are yet to obtain their own campuses, operating instead from temporary locations.
The IITs were originally established as premier institutes of technical learning. Unlike, central and state universities, only the best and the brightest students were expected to seek admission to them and remained to be the most sought after institutions in the domains of technical education. However, over the course time, the demand for increasing the number of IITs grew, owing to a combination of regional politics and growing numbers of applicants.
Due to rise in demands from the student body and the rising advent in the industry, institutes such as IIT Guwahati and IIT Roorkee — which were established in 1994 and 2001 respectively — still cannot match up to the standards of the older IITs. That in turn reflects in dampened employability prospects for those passing out of the new IITs. A rigid focus on quality must be laid on quality from the end of the IITs.
