Gitesh Aggarwal's Review On Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute Of Technology - [NIT], Jalandhar

My college was on improvement streak when I joined it and it is still on the same path. Many things have improved and many are in line. College ranking in NIRF has been steadily getting better every year, this year being 52 in 2020. College management is in good hands, faculty is good, things that require improvement are laboratories and industry relationship. So that student get better practical knowledge and experience and exposure.

Course curriculum is good. It is very practical actually. Industrial and production engineering is a mixture of mechanical engineering and MBA course. We studied a lot about machines and other stuff in 2nd year and in 3rd year we studied many management related subjects which helped me a lot in my job at Tata motors. IPE is actually a very good engineering branch but given very less importance. Drawback that we faced was lack of practical understanding. There were no study tours or practical tours in industry, so that we can relate to the things that we studied in the curriculum. Our first exposure to outside world was during 6-8 week's mandatory summer internship after end of 6th semester. Laboratories at the college were not updated. Also, lab attendants were very complacent about their work. As is the case in most of the government employees. Our professors on the other hand were brilliant academically. They imparted us with a lot of knowledge about life after college and of course about our courses too. I would conclude by saying curriculum in IPE branch was very relevant to the job I did at Tata motors as assistant manager in supply chain management. Only drawback was that I didn't have much practical experience.

Placement in our college is average as compared to other NIT's and IITs. Our alumni network is not so strong. However, most of the eligible students do get a job offer from campus but the highest package offered at our college was not so high during my time as compared to other colleges. Also, for internship after 3rd year, one has to make effort by own. Only 5-10 students were offered internship ( both paid and non paid ) out of 500-600 students in the college. I would rate our college 6 out of 10 in terms of placements and internships.

There are two major fests in our college one in odd semester i.e Techniti ( technical festival) and one in even semester Utkansh ( cultural fest ) and apart from these two many minor events happen all the year round like annual sports meet, college founding day, independence day, republic day celebrations etc. However, Techniti and Utkansh were the fests in which colleges from all over India participated. Both are 3 day events. Techniti included events like robowars, line followers, self made off road concept vehicles by students, many quizes and all sort of technical stuff related to every engineering branch. In Utkansh, there used to be fashion show, star night, many dance and singing competitions, many cultural events. Both the events had a final year student as the convener. Faculty too participated actively in these two events. Sponsorship for the events was searched by students only which were a part of various committees such as literary society, music society, drama society, technical society etc.

At my time fee structure was very affordable, my semester fee was around 21-22 thousand. But it was in the process of increase year by year. Our seniors had 17-18 thousand as their semester free and our juniors had 25 thousand as theirs. Currently, I heard that the fees is approximately 50,000 per semester and many other expenses such as hostel, mess fees etc.

No, I did not avail any scholarship or loan for my degree. So I can't tell you much about it but there were students with me who had education loans sanctioned. And a few students from Nepal had a very good scholarship that paid their entire college fee and also gave them a stipend every month.

Campus Life is full of energy, not much in first semester as you are getting adjusted to the new environment but definitely after that. We had 50-50 all india and Punjab State quota. That meant a lot of peaople from each and every corner of the country. At the end of my degree, I realised that I have a friend from every part of India. Be it Manipur in the east, to leh in the north, ahmedabad in west to Andaman and Nicobar Islands in South. There is lot of diversity and that was at full display during Utkansh. When students from respective states perform their local performances. After semester holidays we used to get a lot of local handmade dishes from all over India. As is the story with most of the engineering colleges in India. Our gender ratio was approximately 1:6 in favour of boys. And in my branch of 50 students, we just had 3 girls. Annual sports meet takes place every year in October and apart from that local tournaments go on throughout the year. Debates, quizes, these also hapeen both during annual fests and around the year organised by various college societies.

Yes, I opted. Hostels were in very bad shape then. They were old constructions from early 90's. In first year, we shared a 4- seater room. From 2nd year till final, we were given a twin sharing room. But now, things have changed, a mega hostel with 1600 bed capacity has been constructed with most of the students getting a single room. At our time PG and PhD students too used to stay with UG students but now their hostels have been separated. At our time hostel fee was just Rs 750 per semester. I don't know about the present scenario.

Alumni network was very weak during my time. But now as an alumni myself, I feel efforts are being made at this front. I get regular updates of college achievement both by e-mail and also on social media. Regular alumni meets take place at various cities in India. An annual Alumni meet takes place each year in college. Social media has helped a lot in strengthening the alumni network.

I got admission in my college 2009. At that time, AIEEE was the entrance test for admission. I got 9363 AIR and 310 state rank in general category. Entrance test happened in April after the board exams. Result was declared in May last week. Counseling procedure started from 2nd week of June. Ours was the first batch for whom online counseling started. There were in total 8-9 rounds of online counseling. 4 of which happened before the college begun. After the 4th round, I had mechanical engineering as my branch. College begun on 27th July 2009. I opted out for the further rounds of counseling. But the last round of counseling didn't ask for any permission. And if in the counseling list there was any branch that was higher up the priority order and seats were vacant in that branch, then the student was upgraded automatically in that branch. So I ended up in computer science engineering. I accepted it as my fete. But after studying c++ in first year, I knew that computer science is not my cup of tea. So I worked hard and scored a good CGPA. In 2nd year, you get 1 more chance, if seats are available in branch of your liking. But unfortunately, seats were not available in mechanical engineering but were available in industrial and production engineering branch which is an allied branch of mechanical engineering. So I opted for that. That's how, I ended up being an industrial and production engineer.

The faculty at our college was absolutely brilliant as is the case with most of the government institutes. All our professors were PhD holders with many having more than 20 years of teaching experience. They helped us not only with our courses but also with the practical information about life after college. They stressed on practical experience and understanding rathere than rote learning to clear exams. But, as is the case with everything. You get a few bad apples with many good ones. I can't complain much about them. That happens in every field of life. But overall, Faculty at NITJ was superb