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Opening IITs is no child’s play: C.N.R. Rao

NEW DELHI: Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Council to the Prime Minister C.N.R. Rao on Friday criticised the government for opening new Indian Institutes of Technology without “proper planning.”

Noting that the new IITs were working from “makeshift campuses,” with some of them even holding classes in existing IITs, he said, “it is not child’s play. To open IITs, you need proper planning. I am very unhappy about it.”

Terming the development a “disaster,” Mr. Rao said he called on Dr. Singh to discuss the issue, but was told that the institutions had already admitted students tovarious courses. He was talking to journalists on the sidelines of a ‘nanotechnology’ conference organised by the Department of Science and Technology and the FICCI.

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