Research comes to a thinking mind naturally. As a Hungarian Biochemist truly said ”Research is to see what everybody else has seen and to think what nobody else has thought”. Remember, as a child each one of us had an extremely potent and research-oriented mind and you would be labeled as ‘inquisitive’ for that? Well that is the prerequisite for a probing mind. To nurture this urge, to encourage thinking, analytical and reasoning skills are what a school or an educational institution must do, ideally. On the contrary education seems to be making every effort to kill the curiosity going literally by the proverb “Curiosity killed the cat”!

Very few institutes and teachers motivate thinkers and researchers who have a great appetite for investigation and find out the ‘truth’. IIIT (International Institute of Information Technology), Hyderabad is one institute, which focuses on research right from the day one. Students are trained to develop research skills and work closely with industry leaders and to help them in undertaking programmers needed in their sectors.

TCG meets the Director IIIT, Hyderabad

Prof. Rajeev Sangal, who has been with the institute right from its inception. He is a leading researcher in the fields of Machine Translation and Artificial Intelligence and is well recognized for his work in Natural Language Processing. He is also the Director of Language Technologies Research Centre. He did his B.Tech from IIT, Kanpur and later received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. In an hour-long discussion Mr. Sangal goes into ideals, vision and dream of IIIT Hyderabad, which surely is a breeding place for geniuses par excellence.

TCG: Why should research be an integral part of an educational institution?

Rajeev Sangal: The main objective behind IIIT Hyderabad is to develop it into a research-based institute that will be useful for the industry and the society. To make this happen, we did the following things:
· We created a research environment in which students were active participants. We started various programmes involving graduates and postgraduates. We set UG research prorgammes too.
· Teaching approach is innovative, it goes on in reverse gear, in the sense, we do not ask questions but create an atmosphere for students to come up with questions.
· Undertaking a large number of projects is our forte‘. These projects require reading, extensive research, exploring upon different facets of an issue etc.

TCG: Shouldn’t this be done this way in any educational institution and not just the IIITs?

Rajeev Sangal: Absolutely, this methodology of seeker/questioner probing for the answer himself or herself is how it must be, to make learning an enriching experience. In fact, our faculty finds it challenging to handle the students in the initial days. The students who enter IIIT after plus two come with a typical mindset, after the rigorous coaching sessions. They want everything to be labeled and categorized. When a problem or question is thrown to them, they ask the teacher, “Is this physics or chemistry?” and out teachers answer nonchalantly, “Neither!” obviously, practical problems in life do not come packaged in subjects or labels! Knowledge should be put to use.

I would like to tell you here about our ‘Layered Learning’, which I am sure is solely practiced here and not anywhere else. It says that education or learning gets better when you practice—theorize—practice. Especially in Computer Science and Electronic Communication, we pull out certain skill components, like use of technology to enable this. Theory comes at its own pace. This process happens for a year. In the third semester, the entire batch undertakes projects, in pairs or groups more than two. Faculty helps them throughout the entire process. In each batch, we have 175 students, guided by faculty, lectures and material. Each project takes semester. This way, an end to end system is built after which the theory comes into picture. This open-ended approach is simple yet powerful in developing a deep insight and constant churning of the mind, which in turn looks for answers inwards rather than simply depending on teachers or outside information.

The advantage of Layered Learning is that students feel empowered and motivated to take up more and more projects that give them an insight into many issues. To give you an analogy, our team is like a typical VaanaraSena, the only difference being their minds on fire and not the tails!

TCG: How are the students motivated to take up projects?

Rajeev Sangal: At most places, students take up projects in the final year and here it happens from the day one. Taking up projects is one part of the story, seeing to it that a project culminates into a fruitful result is another aspect.

When we were into designing the curriculum, we had two major criteria. When a bright student approaches us and says he aspires to build a robot, we must be able to provide him the right guidance/faculty. Number two is that if he says he wants to start it right away, we must be able to give him an emphatic “Yes” in reply. I would like to reiterate that our youngsters have tremendous capabilities and we are not giving them powerful challenges to capitalize on their potential. We need to show them the path they can follow. On their journey, they may discover it is not that easy. Those who find it arduous may drop out, those who have the mettle will pursue with a dogged determination. Either way, it’s a fulfilling journey. This started ten years ago, when we decided research should happen throughout the four years.

 We were a team of people involved in designing the curriculum with a novel approach, where the student is able to choose the area of research and should be able to continue even after he or she leaves IIIT. Curriculum should always allow the student to take on the required area of research. There are practical difficulties like wide choice of areas, like electronics, Computers, VLSI etc. this is where I contributed to the system. A student can choose his or her research area at the end of second year. There are electives available too. For example, if a student cannot make up his or her mind between a walking and talking machine, there is a choice of a course in Robotics and Language and Speech. It is the responsibility of the institute to design a course for the students in the fourth semester, which they can easily understand.

Having three electives in the fourth semester is unthinkable in the Indian education system, and we have it at IIIT.

Thus by the end of the second year, the student has sampled the area that he or she has a fancy for. He will be able to figure out by then if it a mere fancy or genuine interest. Candidate gets registered as research student in the first year and gets the degree as B.Tech Honours. This is a research degree exclusively for those who want to pursue research. Initially this raked criticism, saying it is too laborious a process as hardly one or two out of hundred would opt for it. But since we were firm on the stand, as it is still worth going through this tedious process, it manifested. Now 30% students are going for this. Today a large number of undergraduates have published their papers in conferences. Some of them want to continue working on the problem they have chosen too.

This is how our Dual Degree program took birth. People who wanted to continue with research simultaneously pursued degree of their choice. This came up recently. In Dual Degree student gets a B.Tech Honours in Computer Sciences or in electronics and Communication followed by Master’s Degree. They then get three years to work on that. Thus, it is 5-year course; where in the final year is totally for the thesis. By the third and fourth-year the student already has had one or two papers, followed by major contribution in the last year. We have geniuses and allow them to flower. This is how students enter research. Second aspect is contribution to the society. This is where research comes out of the lab to reach people. Faculty comes into picture here.  Faculty is encouraged to work on solutions for problems that can change the world. Funds follow, so that there are takers for this product.

Students then work on different aspects of the same project. Results are brought together like assembling all the machine parts to work.  Thus new technology, products etc are transferred to the industry.

For example, we have 150 people working on language and vision, which is the largest contingent. This team includes faculty, students - both PG and UG, pooling the cream of brains.

TCG: With which University would IIIT be on par globally?

Rajeev Sangal: It depends on the area. Anyway, in research we are recognized as a major institute worldwide. Especially in Language Technology and Computer Vision, we are in the forefront. Third area is Agent Modeling/Data Engineering.
 
TCG: Can you please name any significant research contributions?

Rajeev Sangal: There are number of them. We built text to speech for Nokia. We have search engine, we would wish to keep it confidential at the moment. This intends to provide search service in 23 languages, of which 13 are European languages. In Computer Vision we have developed security systems for US Railways. They have mounted these cameras before which the (goods) train passes and captures everything. These are ordinary cameras without a wide angle. Our team stitched these photographs to click a giant image of the train in the computer. The second piece of software gives closer picture. This is for the safety. Thus errors are detected and rectified.

TCG: What were your major achievements?

Rajeev Sangal: Undoubtedly, it is the high quality research and teaching. Our major successful venture was in the field of agriculture, which benefited farmers throughout the state. This was seen in the R&D Show Case (20th -21st March), which is an exhibition of budding researcher’s research prowess. Our goal was to provide advice to farmers at low cost, effectively. Our team went to the farmers and recorded their problems, came back with their queries, sought answers from experts in the field of agriculture and in turn, conveyed it to the farmers. Farmers who register themselves will get this advice free of cost, professional advice about land/soil condition, manure and pesticides etc. Pilot project ran for a year in one and it was successful. Now it runs in 5000 farms. When a farmer encounters a problem like the crop being infested, he would mail the photograph after which a solution is sought. We faced a number of problems in this process, for example, when the pictures are big and the internet is slow, attachment takes time or does not happen. In such cases, CDs are transported manually. 

TCG: Do you also have any vocational courses?

Rajeev Sangal: Since IIIT is completely for research, we do not run any vocational courses or distance education. However, we do have outreach programmes. We convert our teaching experience into digital courseware and then train teachers who in turn will use it for their students, this is ‘Train the Trainer’. This can help improve education. We are already doing this for the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Technology.

TCG: Is there any proposal to start courses for those who want to enter IIIT but not through AIEEE?

Rajeev Sangal: There are a few initiatives we have in the pipeline, which are not yet finalized. We are thinking of Integrated Dual Degree programme, one in Computer Science and the other in Humanities. If B. Tech is in CS Masters will be in Humanities. This is how we can get those who wish to pursue Humanities at the same time would like to learn Math too.

TCG: Students coming into IIIT surely have an idea of the subjects being taught here, including Humanities. Why is it that students find difficult to cope with Humanities?

Raieev Sangal: There is something called mental readiness. Many students feel that Humanities is not required to be learnt as a subject in engineering. In fact, I had a student who used to argue with me about learning History! I always tell them it is a part of life, so you may as well, face it and face it with joy, not remorse!

R&D Showcase -March 20th and 21st 2009 was the eighth research and project exhibition of IIIT-Hyderabad, showcasing the prominent research and projects being carried out at the institute. The exhibits were winnowed out from projects covering diverse domains such as Visual Information Technologies, Human Language Technologies, Data Engineering, VLSI and Embedded Systems, Computer Architecture, Wireless Communications, Algorithms and Information Security, Robotics, Building Science, Earthquake Engineering, Computational Natural Sciences and Bioinformatics, Education Technologies, Power Systems, IT in Agriculture, etc.