A Tale of Transition & Tradition : Unpacking IITB’s Latest Curriculum Overhaul

INTRODUCTION

IIT Bombay has long held the reputation of being one of the premier IITs in the country, not only because of the consistently exceptional set of graduates it has produced over the years, but also due to its ability to adapt to changing times throughout the decades. Every few years, as academic standards and industry demands shift, the institute revisits the undergraduate curriculum. This periodic process of curriculum reform brings with it not only renewal but also layers of deliberation and complexity.

2007 was the last time a major overhaul of IITB’s curriculum took place, and it was followed by minor refurbishments in 2013. It was then, in the late 2010s, that the need to restructure the curriculum began to creep in again. Triggered by evolving student expectations, coupled with shifting industrial requirements, the need for curriculum reform had become increasingly evident.

This growing sentiment led to the Senate forming the UG Curriculum Review Committee, chaired by Prof. Kishore Chatterjee in 2019. Also called the Kishore Chatterjee Committee (KCC), it aimed to bring about changes across engineering departments, sciences, humanities, and design. Opinions from across the board were taken into consideration through extensive surveys of students, industry professionals, departments, and even alumni.

Its core principle was recognising the fact that not every student at IITB wanted to be only a technical specialist, and thus, it aimed to strike a careful balance that could provide students with the required depth in their core discipline as well as breadth via exposure to multiple interdisciplinary fields, opening pathways for them across various domains. It also ended up aligning immensely with the National Education Policy of 2020, which focused on the holistic development of students into well-rounded individuals.

Finally, after years of research, deliberation, and compromise, it came into effect in 2022. With its first batch graduating in the coming year, it remains to be seen how these changes play out in practice.
Based on conversations with Prof. Kishore Chatterjee, Prof. Prita Pant, Prof. P. Sunthar, and Prof. Supratik Chakraborty, all members of the Kishore Chatterjee Committee (KCC), Insight traces the process and thinking behind these reforms while attempting to decode the debate at the heart of the new curriculum.

IDENTIFYING THE CHALLENGES

The push for curriculum reform was not one that emerged overnight; it had been simmering for years, fuelled by growing concern and dissatisfaction among faculty, students, and the industry. Labs had become extremely antiquated and overcrowded, leading to a sense of procedural exercise rather than actual experimentation that they were meant for. Theory courses often ran on a different track altogether, with minimal alignment to the laboratory work they were supposed to complement. Furthermore, the foundational first-year courses in engineering drawing and workshop had started to feel obsolete as technological tools and industrial practices rapidly evolved.

Then there was also the long-standing reality that students, more often than not, selected their branches and even institutions based on their JEE ranking and the IIT Bombay tag rather than genuine interest. Most usually weren’t aware, at the young age of 18 years old, what they would want to do for the next forty years of their lives and ended up taking branches and domains that often didn’t align with the goals they developed once exposed to different college opportunities. By the time they entered their second year, the exposure in their freshman year had broadened their horizons, revealing opportunities they either had not been aware of earlier or could not pursue within the confines of their core branch.

Simultaneously, the growth of emerging fields such as machine learning, entrepreneurship, finance and consulting was drawing more and more interest, resulting in fewer people seeing themselves becoming pure technicians or academicians. The evolution of modern-day jobs too started demanding multidisciplinary aspects ranging from business acumen, communication, and leadership skills, things which could simply not develop in the largely theoretical core courses primarily taught. Even opportunities spanning across technical domains weren’t easily available due to the burden of core courses that students were required to complete.

On the other hand, professors found themselves increasingly disheartened by growing disengagement among students, with many being merely physically present while mentally engaged elsewhere, be it pursuing other aspirations during lectures or just not finding core courses worth their time. Students, for their part, were reacting to a curriculum that no longer aligned with their evolving aspirations. As a result, classroom engagement declined, not purely out of neglect but as many felt their academic pathways did not reflect the opportunities they had hoped to explore. This led to discontent across stakeholders and, in turn, birthed a deeply vicious cycle.

It was thus becoming increasingly evident that IIT Bombay had to adapt to the changes around it and the reforms could no longer be deferred.

THE PROCESS

Thus began this herculean task, with the committee first incorporating the opinions and perspectives of all major stakeholders: students, recruiters, faculty, and even alumni, through extensive and detailed surveys in order to extract maximum insight. Placement data of the previous few years (2017 to 2019) was also deeply analysed to observe trends and patterns. Perhaps the most impactful of these was the fact that only 40% of students secured jobs directly aligned with their core fields, while another 40% went into generalist domains such as consultancy, analytics, management, etc. The rest of the 20% pursued higher studies, took up entrepreneurial ventures and other pathways. This highlighted the flaw in basing the curriculum on the assumption that students wanted to pursue their core field, as this accounted for only 40% of the student population. The rest, who required interdisciplinary exposure and soft skills, were treated more as exceptions rather than being in the majority, which was the reality, and this further consolidated the need for a major curriculum reform.

The attempt, however, was to ensure that there was still a balance with academic rigour and not blind flexibility. A framework was designed, which went through several rounds of back and forth between the committee and all departments, providing valuable feedback. After numerous iterations, it was further presented to the Senate and the Institute Faculty Meeting. While not all stakeholders agreed on the extent of core credit reduction, the prolonged deliberations and discussions allowed for maximum perspective and thought to be absorbed. Ultimately, a version was passed based on consensus, although it could be debated whether it was a toned-down version of the ambitious reforms once envisioned, as is often the case when vision meets institutional realities.

STRUCTURAL CHANGES

The deliberations culminated in a new curriculum that was different from its predecessor in its fundamental assumption. This version did not assume that all students would want to pursue their core department and instead provided flexibility.

The first year was perhaps the most transformed as a result of the introduction of the new curriculum, with the aim being to help students understand early on what kind of career they would potentially want to pursue. Students now had department introductory courses (DICs), alongside reduced science courses, the introduction of HASMED courses and a Makerspace course as part of their fresher experience at the institute. While it was earlier focused largely on mathematics, physics, and chemistry, it could now provide students with wider exposure.

The DICs, unlike the previous versions, now not only taught the technical aspects of the core branch but also exposed students to its rich history, deep research, major challenges, and societal impact. These could help students connect with their branches at a deeper level and engage them much more, helping them understand the why behind what they were studying. The vision was for them to understand why it matters beyond just the technical details and to comprehend it not merely in an abstract manner, thereby helping them better gauge their interest in the core domain.

The HASMED courses, meanwhile, were a joint effort by various departments: Humanities and Social Sciences, Institute Design Centre, Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management, and the Desai Sethi Centre for Entrepreneurship, to offer students two courses out of humanities, arts, social sciences, management, entrepreneurship, and design during the first year. This was not only to develop certain holistic aspects in the very first year but also to give them a platform to take up more mandated courses (2-3) in these fields to complete their degree. The vision remained to help the student develop a way of thinking that theory alone never could, in terms of critical thinking, communication skills, and leadership qualities, which are fast becoming major requirements in industries.

The Makerspace course, one of the first ones of its kind in the country, was also an extremely bold step, replacing the traditional workshop and drawing courses. The motive was to help students build something in their very first year, providing a runway to their ambitions through hands-on creation. It was also a way to introduce them to modern-day technologies, which did not rely on old power tools and physical drawings but rather on new machines and software. Being at the intersection of electronics and mechanics, it was intended to allow students to gauge their interests in these fields and perhaps pursue them further through other available routes.

Moreover, an introduction to ML and AI course was made compulsory for all students across departments to be completed mostly by their sophomore year. It came on the back of the rapid rise of machine learning in the past few years, which has completely revolutionised industry as well as learning itself. To help students be aware of these technologies at the very least and not feel lost to them, each department took up the responsibility to conduct these courses according to the needs of the particular domain, curating them accordingly.

Beyond these additions, there was also the restructuring of core and elective courses across four years by essentially diluting the core credit requirements to some extent. The aim was to allow students to complete their core requirements by the fifth or sixth semester, so they could pursue courses according to their will based on their career of choice. Students could now choose to acquire depth in fields of their choice or gain breadth, further diversifying their exposure to topics. It gave students the very flexibility they had demanded by allowing them to carve their education as per their interests and aspirations rather than forcing it uniformly upon everyone.

This brings us to perhaps the most extensively debated and heavily deliberated aspect of the new curriculum: core credit reduction, a topic that requires a deep dive in itself.

THE CORE CONUNDRUM

The idea was to essentially reduce the number of core or domain-specific credits that a student was mandatorily required to complete during their time at the institution, thereby creating greater flexibility to pursue courses of their choice. It arose from a debate that most universities face as roles become increasingly multidisciplinary and hybrid and as the nature of engineering itself continues to evolve. Despite its noble intentions, the idea became one layered with complexities, as it attempted to strike a balance between tradition and future-readiness. Although it was not very well received by most departments initially, after months of discussion and compromise, a middle ground of sorts was eventually reached, with core credits being diluted to some extent.

The debate primarily arises from the foundational idea of what IITB, as an institute, envisions its students to become: specialists deeply connected to their core field or generalists with the ability to adapt to emerging opportunities. The generalist school of thought feels strongly that the institute should focus more on the all-around development of students rather than solely on domain knowledge, so they are better prepared to face the post-college, dynamic professional world. Over the last few years, as opportunities have expanded in areas such as consulting, finance, technomanagerial roles, and more, there has been a growing consensus among students who feel that several core courses do not contribute meaningfully to these non-traditional paths. The need of the hour has become skills such as adaptability, communication, data literacy, and cross-domain awareness, even in the most technical of roles, aspects which barely get touched upon in most theoretical core courses. Some professors too recognised this shift, both through their own experiences as well as through the multiple surveys that the committee conducted. They acknowledged that this is a demand that simply cannot be ignored if IITB is to progress into a world-class institution. A reduction in core credits essentially allows students to build portfolios according to their own interests, take courses they genuinely wish to pursue, and prepare for varied career trajectories. This demand for flexibility through minors, honours, interdisciplinary electives, internships, etc., has seen a massive spike in the last few years, and the committee identified it early on itself. A future-ready IITB should allow students to explore rather than confine them, broadening their horizons further.

Yet a significant segment of the faculty remained unconvinced. They feel a risk of their core subjects losing importance. Since students enter IITs knowing they will graduate as engineers (or scientists in some cases) in their particular domain, it is crucial that they acquire sufficient foundational knowledge to justify that title. IITB’s repute has been built across decades due to the strong engineering fundamentals its graduates possess, and a dilution could potentially weaken the IITB brand. Core courses form the foundation of understanding and learning in the respective domains, and if a Mechanical Engineer is unable to understand basic Thermodynamics, for example, it would reflect poorly on the institute itself. While the paths may diverge further down the line, ultimately, a student would hold on to the tag of an IIT graduate for their entire life. There is an emotional aspect too, with faculty members deeply attached to their departments and subjects, not wishing to see erosion in what they consider essential components of their discipline. They also worry that excessive reduction would produce students who become shallow generalists, unable to perform even basic analysis in their disciplines. Furthermore, lack of core credits may also leave students underprepared for advanced electives, negatively impacting the quality of these courses. It is important to understand, however, that faculty, too, do not oppose flexibility completely but rather wish for responsible reforms rather than those that only make things easy and encourage shortcuts.

The real conflict then boils down to finding the right balance and defining what counts as the ‘foundational’ courses. There are wildly differing opinions about what counts as foundational across departments and even among professors. While some feel the mandatory courses should only make students aware of the field and leave it up to them to decide what they wish to pursue, others feel more in-depth knowledge is necessary for an IIT graduate engineer. Given the vast differences in course structures and philosophies across departments, the matter only becomes more subjective. How many credits suffice for a strong foundation remains an open question. This very disagreement among faculty and the committee led to prolonged deliberations but also ensured slow, careful progress to avoid leaving any group dissatisfied.

CONCLUSION

As the discourse on which courses should count as mandatory continues, a middle ground seems to emerge, with an attempt for core courses themselves to inculcate modern-day required aspects in their own way. Hands-on activities, well-designed courses, and interaction-based learning could help preserve the engineering backbone while simultaneously developing essential contemporary skills. In today’s times, it is becoming clearer that some extent of core reduction is not only logical but inevitable. Yet it needs to be done in a sensitive and well-thought-out manner that recognises faculty concerns while also ensuring the reduction is not arbitrary but well-guided. The real question is not whether core credits should be reduced but rather how they could be redesigned to ensure foundational strength while also enabling modern relevance. And this question, for now, continues to define the academic moment IITB finds itself in.