The National Institute of Technology Calicut (NIT-C) has secured the ninth rank at the national level in the Atal Ranking of Institutions on Innovation Achievements (ARIIA-2021).
The institute is also the first among NITs in the category of Centrally Funded Technical Institutes, Central Universities, and Institutes of National Importance (Technical).
NIT-C Director Prof. Prasad Krishna lauded the efforts of stakeholders for the achievement. The hard work of the entire NIT-C fraternity helped the institute retain the top position despite constraints due to the pandemic, he said.
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To promote entrepreneurial culture among students, the NIT-C’s Institute Innovation Council (IIC), set up with the guidance of the MIC Institute of Technology, regularly conducts workshops and mentoring programmes. Many students have developed prototypes and won prizes under IIC guidance.
Besides, NIT-C had set up a Technology Business Incubator (TBI-NITC) in 2003-04 with the support of the National Science and Technology Entrepreneurship Development Board (NSTEDB), Department of Science and Technology, to incubate start-ups in IT and electronics.
TBI has extended incubation facilities to 88 start-ups so far. Many training programmes are conducted throughout the year for entrepreneurs to help them set up and grow businesses. A dedicated Fab Lab facility is being set up at the institute for innovators.
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From around ₹1.64-crore research funding in 2014-15, NIT-C has grown to securing a funding of ₹6.89 crore in 2020-21. To promote and nurture innovations by students, the institute has initiated funding to the tune of around ₹25 lakh since 2018.
The Department of Science and Technology (DST), Kerala State Council for Science Technology and Engineering (KSCSTE), Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Directorate of Environment and Climate Change, and National Agricultural Science Fund (NASF) are some of the agencies with which NIT-C has research collaborations.
This apart, NIT-C received around ₹75 lakh as consultancy fee from the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB), and the Public Works Department (PWD).
Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, bio-signal processing, bioinformatics, health informatics, biomedical engineering, Robotics, power electronics, nanotechnology, and neuroscience are the areas where research projects are undertaken by various departments of NIT-C.
NIT-C was granted 14 patents and three copyrights for technologies developed by its researchers since 2018, and 20 patent applications are under evaluation.