A PhD student's life at NIT Calicut

I had joined NITC calicut way back in 2014 for my MTech and then continued with my PhD program in the same college. I joined this college because it has a very well equipped lab for control systems specialization which was something I was looking forward to back then. The pros about the college is that everything is very systematic which is also quite annoying at times as there is severe penalty for breaking the rules.

I had joined in the Instrumentation and Control Systems (ICS) specialization (MTech) of the EE department and then moved towards Control Systems during my PhD. The teacher student ratio in PG courses is mostly in the ratio of 1:20. Most of the teachers evaluate their students on a continuous basis through various assignments to assess their level of understanding. The institute is extremely punctual as far as exams are concerned and scoring is difficult for certain specializations such as ICS.

Not admissible for me as I am not interested in working for companies. I am rather interested in post-doc opportunities which can get me going in my research career. Hence I haven't registered for placement activities and not aware of the placement records.

The fee structure is at par with most of the other NITs. Job offers are quite good if you register in the placement cell. Most of the reputed firms come for recruitment during the placement windows. I am currently availing MHRD scholarship for pursuing my PhD studies in this institute.

The campus life is awesome. There are a host of clubs to be associated with such as Robotics Club, Aeronautics Club etc. Ragam and Tathva are the annual cultural and technical festivals respectively. Our library is very well stacked with the latest technical literature consisting of books and reputed journals. The online facilities offered by the library is also very good.

The hostels facilities are pretty good. The food is OK and doesn't cause stomach issues, although the taste may not be that good always. I have stayed in a number of hostels ranging from MBA Hostels to Mega Boys Hostels along with G-Hostel and PG-2. Amongst them, MBA Hostels offered the best accomodation in terms of spaciousness while PG-2 and G-hostels are most convenient in terms of internet facilities and campus assessibility.

I faced two rounds of interview during my PhD admission process. The first round was the elimination round where the topics were purely related to basics of subjects. The second round consisted of discussion on my research proposal which I had mentioned during the application process.