Mandi, 5 October 2018: A total of 276 students graduated during the Seventh Convocation of Indian Institute of Technology Mandi held today (5th October 2019) in the presence of faculty, staff, students, parents and other dignitaries. Out of these, 22 are PhD scholars, 10 are get MS research degree, 60 MTech , MSc 54 and BTech 130.

Since its First Convocation in 2013, IIT Mandi has awarded a total of 1135 degrees, including 89 Ph.D., 50 M.S. (by Research), 87 M.Tech., 121 M.Sc., and 788 B.Tech. degrees.

In a message shared with the Institute on the occasion, the Honorable Vice-President of India Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu congratulated the graduating students and commended IIT Mandi for continuously developing new academic programs with increasing number of students graduating every year justifying its motto “Scaling the Heights”.

Degrees awarded were:

Shri Jai Ram Thakur, Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, in a message shared with the Institute, congratulated all the graduating students. In his message, Shri Thakur applauded IIT Mandi for emerging as “an excellent hub of science and technology by bringing out engineering professionals and providing a platform to the youth of Himachal for pursuing their goals and paving their path for a bright future in several areas of engineering with their theoretical and experimental work.”

Shri Bandaru Dattatraya, Governor of Himachal Pradesh also congratulated the graduating students and the Institute in his message to the Institute.

The Institute also received congratulatory messages from Shri Sanjay Dhotre (Minister of State in the Ministries of Human Resource Development, Communications, and Electronics & Information Technology, Government of India), Shri Bikram Singh (Minister for Industries, Labour and Employment, and Technical Education, HP Government) and Shri R. Subrahmanyam (Secretary, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India).

Delivering the Chief Guest Address, Padma Bhushan Shri Babasaheb Neelkanth Kalyani, Chairman and Managing Director, Bharat Forge Limited, said, “I had never imagined that such a magnificent campus could be located in a remote valley in the middle of the Himalayas. I am really happy about the kind of academic atmosphere that everyone here has developed in this serene location.”

Further, he added that, “Solving for India means solving 40% or more of the world and IIT Mandi students will play a major role in developing these scalable solutions. IIT Mandi’s Technology Business Incubator (TBI) Catalyst, has been successful in attracting entrepreneurs from several parts of the country and has close to 15 commercial and social start-ups in its portfolio from various sectors. I’ve also come to know that IIT Mandi runs a project called Enabling the Women of Kamand (EWOK) which is working towards building a network to bring information on employment and providing training opportunities to local women, sharing their qualifications and availability with potential employer.”

Addressing the audience, Prof. Timothy A. Gonsalves, Director, IIT Mandi, said, “At present, IIT faculty are working on 225 projects worth more than Rs. 110 crores. In the academic year 2018-2019, the Institute has received 45 projects of value more than Rs. 15.5 crores. IIT Mandi has received $315,000 funding from Intel, USA, in 2012 for VLSI resist materials: state-of-the-art in 2012 was 22 nanometre (nm). IIT Mandi achieved 20 nm in 2014 and 10 nm in 2018. The Institute has indigenised 11 out of 34 chemicals used in SCL Mohali’s lab. Publication of research is the most important work for knowledge creation and dissemination. Our faculty during the past 10 years have published over 1400 research publication including several books published by internationally recognised publishers.

Speaking on the occasion, Shri Subodh Bhargava, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Mandi, said, “I am happy to say that women joining the B.Tech. programme of the Institute has risen to 20.23%, which exceeds the Institute’s target of 20% for the year 2019.  Let me also add that IIT Mandi is the 1st among all IITs in respect of the number of women faculty.”

The audience listened with rapt attention to this year’s Valedictorian’s address. Ms. Preeti M. Kannapan, winner of this year’s Rani Gonsalves Memorial Medal and Institute Silver Medals for Mechanical Engineering branch, said, “IIT Mandi is a unique combination of a number of remarkable things. The curriculum seems to be ahead of many other engineering institutes in India and even internationally. It gave us the freedom to pursue courses and projects across traditional boundaries of Mechanical, Electrical, Civil and Computer Science branches with faculty encouraging and welcoming such exploration. I am currently pursuing my Master’s in Robotics, and I have seen that a number of my classmates from various backgrounds don’t have the same exposure to different fields that I was able to get over here. On top of this, we were able to spend our four college years in this beautiful Himalayan setting. Where else could one get this type of education, the brand name of IIT, as well as enjoy the mountains, rivers and snowfall?”

The event concluded with the singing of the national anthem by the assembled audience.