Present Engineering Education in India — An Emerging Economy — And a Glimpse of the Scenario in the 21^st Century

Abstract

After gaining independence from Britain in 1947, Prime Minister Nehru conceived the vision of present day engineer and engineering education for the ultimate economic development of the country. He immediately asked the planners and educationists to plan and establish engineering institutions of various levels all over the country with the help of willing developed economies like USA, Germany, U.K., and Sweden.

The first three decades saw coming up of engineering polytechnics, regional colleges, national institutes and universities in India, that led Indians emerge at present as a leading group of people from a country, earlier an underdeveloped one but today one of the top in the world in the field of computers, software, internet etc., expert engineers and biggest entrepreneurs operating in the leading economies. Hitherto emphasis had been on producing theoretically taught engineers with focus on theory and research aspects, sidelining more emphasis on practical training and educating them as a global engineer. This concept is, now for future being changed. More and more new institutions are being set up by Indian billionaires living abroad, which are going to be citadels of Global Engineering Education in the 21^st Century.

The talk covers the history of engineering institutions and education since independence up to the present day and visualizes the scenario in the millennium.