Studies at the seven Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) may get severely disrupted with 3,000-odd professors of the institute protesting against the new HRD minister and drawing up a series of agitation programmes, beginning Thursday, over the non-implementation of the 6th Pay Commission and other issues.

Speaking to Financial Chronicle, Professor Kanchan Chowdhury, president of IIT Kharagpur Teachers’ Association, said, “We will try to ensure that the student community does not suffer. Being responsible teachers, we are in a difficult situation to press hard for our demands.”

At its last meeting on July 24 the All India IIT Faculty Federation (AIIITFF) resolved to take recourse to several expressions of protest such as wearing black armbands/badges and mass if the government continued to ignore the plight of the IIT faculty.

“Even while deciding on a course of action like mass casual leave, we are trying to work out something so that students’ academic losses are compensated,” Chowdhury said.

The seven IITs — New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Guwahati and Roorkee — have cl-ose to 35,000 students.

“The general situation in the IITs is already quite stressful. For, as per the policy of the Centre on OBC reservations, the IITs have accepted a large increase in student intake. However, it has not been possible for the institutions to build the infrastructure required or to recruit faculty at the pace required,” he added.

The faculty is also burdened as the teaching and evaluation load for faculty has greatly increased. Since the new IITs have to be mentored by the existing IITs, these new units have added to the burden of the faculty.

The AIIITFF meeting also expressed shock on the decision of the HRD ministry for dropping the IITs from the list of institutes of excellence.

A professor at IIT Delhi who did not wish to be named said that while they had received a mail regarding the agitation, they weren’t aware of any concrete action of the same.