Life in an IIT | Why I picked IIT Guwahati over Bombay

Growing up in Bori

I come from a very small village called Bori, in the Parbhani district of Maharashtra. I completed my schooling till Class 10 in Latur at Podar International School, and then moved back to my district for high school. My father is a farmer, and my mother is a homemaker. There isn’t much to do back home besides wandering through the fields or waiting out those long power cuts, so I can’t say I miss the village itself. What I do miss is my parents.

Growing up, I looked up to Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, and somewhere along the way, I decided that if I wanted a career in the sciences and wanted to be even a fraction as accomplished as him, engineering was the way to do it. For a middle-class family like mine, an IIT seat felt like the most sensible, most respected path available. I was always comfortable with studies, so leaning into science and preparing for JEE was a fairly natural decision – I never really overthought it.

The JEE journey

I appeared for JEE Main and JEE Advanced in 2023. My preparation was like that of most other JEE aspirants – around eight hours of study a day. The real challenge wasn’t the syllabus, though; it was my own phone. I was a hosteller through school, and between Netflix and YouTube, controlling my screen time was something I genuinely could not manage on my own. I tried several screen-time apps, and between those and a fair amount of willpower, I somehow held the line and stayed consistent through preparation.

Choosing ECE over mechanical

When JoSAA counselling came around, I was stuck between two very different options: Mechanical Engineering at IIT Bombay and Electronics and Communication Engineering at IIT Guwahati. Electronics had always made sense to me; I’d had a knack for building things since I was a kid, and it being a circuital branch meant strong placement opportunities too. But if I’m honest, the deciding factor was the IIT Guwahati campus itself. I had seen pictures of it, and the Northeast pulled me in so much that I ended up putting Guwahati above everything else on my list.

Away from home

I came to IIT Guwahati in August 2023. It wasn’t my first time living away from home, but it was the farthest I had ever been. Guwahati welcomed me in its own way; the early sunset caught me completely off guard. By 6 pm, it’s almost pitch dark there, which is not something you experience in Maharashtra. I went in as an outgoing person and made it a point to talk to absolutely everyone I crossed paths with in my first year. Over time, that wide circle naturally narrowed down to a close set of friends and a few seniors who looked out for me, though I stayed on good terms with almost everyone I’d met.

Finding life beyond academics

I had always loved clicking pictures, so early on I joined Montage, the photography club, which is where I picked up a camera for the first time in my life. It became something close to an obsession. I started as the photographer for a play by Xpressions, the dramatics society, then for Octaves, the music club and band, and from there I slowly drifted into cinematography and videography as well.

In my second year, I became the Media Head of the Cultural Board at IIT Guwahati, responsible for managing media and outreach for 11 cultural clubs and the Board’s own page. It was the first time in my life that I saw something other than studies as a possible career path. The same year, I joined team Alcheringa, the institute’s cultural fest committee, as Events Executive, where I ended up directly managing more than 10 artists on ground, handling logistics, sponsors, and organising ProNite (short for Professional Night, a cultural program held during annual events at the institute) at scale. It felt like a dream come true.

From media head to overall coordinator

In my third year, I took on a much bigger role as Overall Coordinator of the Cultural Board, managing budgets across all 11 clubs and two fests, running a calendar of more than 85 events, and leading a team of over 25 people. It was during this time that I decided to revive the Campus Broadcasting System (CBS), which had been shut down for a few years. I’d noticed that we hosted incredibly talented people at our events year-round but had no record of any of it. So I built a new team from scratch, a studio-grade live production unit with eight-plus cameras, and CBS now has over 50,000 views. All of this ran alongside my coursework, and my professors were genuinely supportive throughout it. I don’t think I was ever bored at IIT Guwahati.

I also took on the responsibility of managing a contingent of more than 220 people for the Inter-IIT Cultural Meet 8.0, overseeing the preparation budget, travel and accommodation, discussing strategy with every club secretary, and being present through daily practice and all three days of the meet, making sure my team had what they needed to perform at their best.

Lessons from IIT

Coming from a small village where academics was the only thing that mattered, IIT Guwahati opened up an entirely different spectrum of life for me. One of my fondest memories from this journey is of our Dean of Student Affairs, Mr Perumal, who guided us through Alcheringa like we were his own children, patiently walking us through problems we, as students, were facing for the first time. If I had to sum up the single biggest thing IIT taught me, it would be this: the best time to start is now.

Life in Guwahati

When I’m not working on an event, I’m usually at the New SAC or in hostel rooms with friends. I’ve taken to cycling around campus, and most mornings I try to make it down to the banks of the Brahmaputra for chai; the river and its ghats are easily my favourite part of the city. Food-wise, I’m a creature of habit: Margherita pizza with Cheese Burst or Cheese Volcano crust from Domino’s, and the veg Whopper from Burger King, more often than I’d like to admit.

I manage my expenses with pocket money from my parents, supplemented by freelance videography and photography gigs. I was also brought on as Marketing Manager for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2025, which came with a decent stipend. There’s no shortage of such opportunities if you go looking for them, and campus life itself is fairly inexpensive to sustain.

Most of my friends outside IIT, at other colleges, NITs included, think almost entirely about placements. I worry about that too, but I’d like to think the years spent managing budgets, teams, and events have prepared me for things a purely academic record wouldn’t.

Looking ahead

I’m hoping for a campus placement in consulting or a project management role; if that doesn’t work out, an MBA is the backup plan. Further down the line, say 25 years from now, I’d like to enter public life in some capacity, possibly contest for an MLA seat or something similar. It’s been a childhood dream of mine.

Looking back, growing up in a household where academics were everything meant I never really explored anything beyond it. IIT Guwahati changed that completely, sometimes a little too well. I’m now in my final year, consciously pulling my focus back to academics after a few years of throwing myself entirely into everything the campus had to offer.