498 students awarded PhD this year: IIT-B records rise in number of PhDs awarded in last 5 yrs

Data from the past four years shows an increase in the number of students awarded PhDs every year indicating increased research-work at IIT Bombay.

According to the institute, this is a result of steady growth in infrastructural support at IIT Bombay, which is conducive to research. It also gives credit to beginning of newer research domain such as in the field of bio-sciences, bio-engineering among others, which has led to more number of students pursuing PhD at IIT Bombay.

In the academic year 2021-22, the institute awarded 449 PhDs. Whereas in academic years 2020-21 and 2019-20, the institute has awarded 378 and 381 PhDs respectively. In all these years, the number of male students who received PhDs is more than female students.

Director of IIT Bombay, Prof Shireesh Kedare attributed this success to increased research opportunities at the institute with various capacity building measures.

“This increase is directly proportional to our capacity to handle a greater number of PhDs, especially with good faculty support as well as infrastructural development in terms of newer laboratories, more sophisticated technologies. At the same time, we are also now exploring various more areas of research work such as bio-medical so students in these areas too are coming for research. But maximising our capacity has really helped as we cannot take more than a certain number of students for research to ensure effective work.”

After starting a new concept of “commencement ceremony”, which is a newer format of convocation held earlier in the year for all “likely to graduate” students so that none of them miss out the ceremony, the convocation and DDAF are now internal events at IIT Bombay at academic units of the degree recipients.

According to information shared by the institute, the DDAFs of the 62nd convocation were presided over by a departmental chief guest, head of department and faculty members of the department.

For the academic year 2023-24, a total of 3,303 degrees were awarded to 3,019 students including 674 female and 2,345 male students.

The President of India’s Gold Medal was bestowed on Vedang Dhirendra Asgaonkar, a B.Tech student from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering.

The Dr. Shankar Dayal Sharma Gold Medal was conferred on Kaivalya Sanjay Daga, a B.Tech student from the Department of Mechanical Engineering.

PhDs of five years

Undergraduate degrees awarded for 2023-24

B. Tech – 951

Dual Degree – 358

Interdisciplinary dual degree – 100

Four Year BS – 64

Dual Degree (BS+MSc.) – 10

Bachelor of Design – 20

Dual degree in design – 18

Three-year BS – 31

Postgraduate degrees awarded for 2023-24

M. Tech – 635

MS by research – 46

MA by research – 15

Dual degree – 4

Master in Design – 69

MA – 1

M. Phil – 2

Two-year MSc. 290

MBA – 110

EMBA – 44

Masters in Public Policy – 12