IIT-Delhi Establishes School of Artificial Intelligence To Offer PhD and PG Degrees

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi today announced that the institute has established an independent School of Artificial Intelligence (ScAI) on its campus. The AI school will commence its PhD program from the next admission cycle, i.e. January 2021. The Tier-I institute is also planning to offer postgraduate (PG) degree courses.

According to sources, some of the key objectives of the ScAI includes-

• To bring together the more than fifty IIT Delhi faculty members individually invested in various aspects of the field. With this, ScAI expects to act as a force multiplier for overall research productivity.
• To provide external branding to IIT Delhi in this field of immense importance. A cohesive group in AI will allow focused hiring of faculty members and students to increase global visibility. It will become a one-stop centre for industry or government interested in collaborating or funding AI innovations.

V. Ramgopal Rao, Director, IIT Delhi stated, “A program in AI is needed because current degrees are broad-based, and do not make it easy for students to learn the depths of different subfields within AI.” He added, “One of the goals of setting up ScAI is also to strengthen IIT Delhi’s place on the global map of AI.”

The school will include flexible faculty model, which means it will include core faculty, joint faculty, and adjunct faculty members who may also be from the industry. The school is expecting to hire at least 20 core faculty members in the next 10 years. 

As per reports, the new school also aims to provide a platform for industry, government, and civil society entities to share their domain problems, which will then be matched with IIT-Delhi faculty with the relevant expertise.

Prof Mausam, School of AI’s Founding Head stated, “Core faculty members will be those who consider AI, or its applications in various domain areas (e.g., healthcare, transportation), as their main research area. Core faculty members will also be responsible for developing the School and will be deeply invested in its success.”