Last night, in a Facebook post, IIT Bombay Director Professor Subhasis Chaudhuri said the decision was made “after a long deliberation”
MUMBAI| Following the spike in coronavirus cases across the nation the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay has become the first major institute to scrap all face-to-face lectures for the rest of the year “so that there is no compromise on the safety and well-being of the students”.
Last night, in a Facebook post, IIT Bombay Director Professor Subhasis Chaudhuri said the decision was made “after a long deliberation”.
The post read as, “For IIT Bombay, students are the first priority. We took the first step in India in concretely deciding how we must bring closure to the current semester to help our students.”
“But given the current condition of the pandemic, how do we plan for the next semester for our students? Again, after a long deliberation in the Senate, we have decided today that the next semester will be run purely in the online mode so that there is no compromise on the safety and well-being of the students,” he further added.
The semester for undergraduate and post-graduate courses is scheduled to begin in July. The post also had an appeal for donation for students “from economically less privileged families.”
The post further read, “A large section of our students come from economically less privileged families and would require a helping hand to equip them with the IT hardware (i.e. laptops and broadband connectivity ) to take these online classes.”
Appealing for the donations, Mr Chaudhari wrote, “We have estimated that we need about Rs 5 crores to help those needy students. We look forward to your overwhelming support to help these bright young minds to continue their learning without any further hindrances or delays.”
Across India, the coronavirus tally has crossed 4.56 lakh cases. With 1.39 lakh cases, Maharashtra is the worst-hit and Mumbai alone has logged nearly 70,000 cases so far.
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