IITs step up to plug the gap in AI education in training, offer short-term courses too

During his Interim Budget speech, Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said that the government is launching a national programme for artificial intelligence (AI). As a part of the programme, nine Centres of Excellence to leverage AI will be built.

According to NITI Ayog's National Strategy for AI Discussion Paper, AI has the potential to drive growth through enabling intelligent automation, labour, and capital augmentation, and innovation diffusion.

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AI in healthcare can address and bridge the gaps related to access of facilities beyond the metro cities. Similarly, it can also solve quality and accessibility issues in the education sector. In logistics, AI can solve traffic management.

But, there’s a catch.

NITI Ayog says that there is an "inadequate availability of AI expertise, manpower, and skilling opportunities", in India.

"India has talent friction - we have a lot of people and a lot of vacancies as well. But we require finished goods for these jobs. With the practices that academic institutions are adopting today, they are unable to provide the right kind of tools and exposure. If we don't change this now, even after 10 years, we won't be able to create 20 percent of the specialist talent that we require," says Kamal Karanth, Co-founder of Xpheno, Bengaluru-based talent solutions company.

Universities are unable to keep up with creating courses in emerging technologies because of the speed at which these technologies develop.

He adds, "Our finishing schools are not great. Today even large companies have factories they train employees for six months. If that much time is spent during the academic years with industry collaboration, it would be helpful.”

Nevertheless, the IITs are now stepping up to the challenge and rolling out a slew of short-term courses designed to provide the Indian industry with the talent it needs. Many of these courses are meant for recent graduates and working professionals.

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Rolling out courses

IIT Hyderabad

• B.Tech in AI - IIT Hyderabad was the first Indian institute to introduce this.
• Professional Programme in AI and Emerging Technologies - Considered a first of its kind, it is a five-week residential programme meant for recent graduates and senior college students. It is offered in partnership with TalentSprint.

"IIT Hyderabad's decision to start a BTech programme in AI is a step in the direction to address the urgent needs of the country in this space," says Sumohana S. Channappayya, Associate Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Hyderabad.

The institute already offers an MTech programme in data science and machine learning.

IIT Kharagpur

• Up to 30 subjects on the different aspects of AI are offered by the departments of Computer Science and Engineering here. While most have been available for years, the institute started courses based on industry requirements and student demand.

"The Centre for AI launched a new subject on 'Deep Learning Foundations and Applications' this semester to cater to the large demand among students. It also plans to launch more AI courses in the coming semesters," said Professor Sudeshna Sarkar, Head of Centre of AI and Department of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT Kharagpur, to YourStory.

• A six-month course on the 'Foundations of AI and Machine Learning’, which will be conducted only on weekends. It is spread over 16 modules on theory, methods, tools, applications and a capstone project.

"This will be offered in Bengaluru, Kharagpur and possibly Hyderabad from March 2019. We are also planning to launch a certificate course on 'Advanced Machine Learning’ later this year," Sudeshna said.

One can simply enrol by providing basic information and applying through the institute's website. After an online computer based test, candidates will be called for interview. According to their website, for the March 2019 cohort, the course fee is Rs 4,00,000.

IIT Madras

• Opened the Robert Bosch Centre for Data Science and AI to focus on research in deep learning, reinforcement learning, network analysis, interpretable machine learning and domain aware AI.

Professor Balaraman Ravindran, Head of RBC-DSAI, and a member of the faculty in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, said:

"IIT Madras has a strong interdisciplinary programme in data science and AI. This encourages students to explore applications of AI in different domains. We have an interdisciplinary dual degree (B.Tech + M.Tech) programme on data science and AI, as well as an interdisciplinary research program on data sciences."

•  Dual degree in Robotics, which will help in manufacturing analytics, financial analytics, Smart Cities, systems biology and healthcare.
• Several startups in the AI and Data Science space have been incubated in the IIT Madras Research Park, funded by companies like Bosch, Tata Consultancy Services, Ericsson R&D, Intel Research and GE Research.

IIT Madras also works with government organisations, including defence services, Railways, and Chennai Transportation Corporation, typically addressing key challenges they face using cutting-edge technology in AI and data science.

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