Birla Institute of Technology and Science
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Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, Rajasthan, India (popularly known as 'BITS Pilani') is one of the premier technology schools of India. In addition to Pilani, BITS has 2 other campuses. These are BITS Pilani-Goa Campus in Sancole, Goa, India, and BITS Pilani-Dubai Campus in the (UAE). BITS Pilani also has an extension centre in Bangalore.
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Rankings
The magazine Asiaweek published its latest rankings of science and technology schools in the Asia-Pacific region in 2000. BITS Pilani was ranked in the Top 20 (overall), and in the Top 5 in terms of 'Student Selectivity'.
The management programmes offered by BITS Pilani have also been ranked by Asiaweek (Top 30 Best Full-Time MBA, Top 30 By Reputation, Top 5 Distance MBA). These programmes have also been profiled by Business Week Online (The Best B Schools).
Annual rankings of engineering colleges in India have been published by the magazine India Today since 1997. BITS Pilani was ranked in the Top 10 consistently (1997-2004), but opted out of the survey since 2005.
BITS Pilani was also the only Indian university to be ranked in the the Top 20 Wired organisations of India by Business Today (January 18, 2004 issue).
Institute History
It was founded by Shri Ghanshyam Das Birla in 1926 as an intermediate college.
Ford Foundation
BITS Pilani received support from the Ford Foundation as well as benefited from a long-standing alliance with the MIT, Cambridge.
Pilani Campus
Highlights
- 328 acre (1.3 km²)
- Museum
- Saraswati Mandir
Hostels
There are 12 hostels in total in Pilani, two dedicated to girl students. Each student gets his or her own room
- Ashok Bhawan
- Bhagirath Bhawan
- Budh Bhawan
- Gandhi Bhawan
- Krishna Bhawan
- Malviya Bhawan - For Girl Students.
- Meera Bhawan - For Girl Students.
- Ram Bhawan
- Rana Pratap Bhawan
- Shankar Bhawan
- Viswakarma Bhawan
- Vyas Bhawan
Labs and other facilities
Current Initiatives
BITS Pilani is the pioneer of university-industry linkage program in India. It is also setting new standards in distance learning programs with its virtual university going online. BITSConnect, an alumni initiative, has commissioned a $50 million VLSI Lab initiative which aims to conduct semiconductor research and development, now called as the "O-Lab". BITS Pilani is a key partner in several international initiatives like the development (http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in/csd/Home/projects/js.html) of JournalServer open-access digitial library, the Project IPV6 (http://ipv6.bits-pilani.ac.in/), etc.
Other BITS Campuses
BITS has established two campuses in addition to Pilani -- in Dubai, UAE, and in Goa, India. It also has an extension centre in Bangalore, India.
BITS,_Pilani.jpg
Admission Procedure
Old Selection Procedure
BITS used to admit students on the basis of the marks they score in their respective class XII examinations regardless of the state/board that conducts it. As there is a noticeable difference in both the quality of education as well as the marks awarded to candidates across different boards in different states, BITS conducted a process called "normalization" to bring some level of parity between applicants across India.
Normalisation
To bring all candidates from the different examining authorities/boards on the same scale of comparison and to create a merit list in linear order, the Institute has practiced a system known as normalisation. It basically tried to find the relative displacement of a candidate from the his/her board topper. As such the first rank student of each board was considered to have obtained 100% marks and the aggregate marks of all other students from that board are normalised with reference to the aggregate marks obtained by the first rank student of that board. For example, if the aggregate marks of the first rank student of a board is 94%, his normalised aggregate is 100% and if a student from the same Board has obtained 88% marks, then his normalised percentage will be (88×100)/94 = 93.61.
New Procedure from 2005
BITS has introduced a totally new admission procedure (http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in/Admissions/bitsat2005.html). The admission for Pilani and Goa campuses will be through a on-line computer test (BITSAT) which will be held between April 10 - June 20 in many cities all over India.
The exams consist of English, Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and Logical Reasoning and is focussed on 11th and 12th standard coursework. Students are required to get 80% in PCM in their board examinations for them to be eligible for the exam. The board results may come out after the admission exam results, but are required for consideration. This is because BITS Pilani believes that attending normal classroom sessions in 11th and 12th standard is important for all-round development of the students.
But board toppers need not take the exam as they will be considered admitted without any exam. This is done to make sure that BITS retains the 20+ board toppers from boards across the country who join BITS every year.
48,325 students have taken the BITSAT in 2005. As the institute has 1,400 places, the acceptance rate is 1 in 35 (less than 3%).
Annual Festivals
APOGEE
A Professions Oriented Gathering Over Educational Experience (APOGEE) -- it is the annual Technical Festival of BITS, Pilani with projects ranging from Highway Traffic Control Systems to Natural language Parsers to Optical Character Recognition Tools. The highlights of this 5 day festival are the many projects on display by the students, technical paper presentations, numerous contests (both fun science and hard-core tech) and the two quizzes: Brain of BITS (BOB), which have teams of one, and Over Head Transmission (OHT), a team quiz.
For more information on the fest, please click on APOGEE (http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in/apogee)
BOSM
The BITS Open Sports Meet (BOSM) is the annual All India sports festival organised entirely by the students of BITS, Pilani.
Oasis
Oasis is an All India cultural festival organised entirely by the students of BITS, Pilani. Oasis is organised in the month of October.The Budget of the fest is around 15 lakhs (around US$ 35,000). For the past 30 years, Oasis has been providing a platform to students from all over the country to showcase their talents.
Visit the page http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in:12349/oasis2k4/htmlsite/htmlindex.html for further details.
BITSians of Note
Padma Shri Award Winners
- Dr. D. Balasubramanian - Director, LV Eye Institute
Winners of the Dewang Mehta Award for Innovation, India's Highest Award for Technology
- Dr. Vijay Chandru - Inventor of the Simputer, Founder of Strand Genomics, Professor of IISc Bangalore
- Rajesh Hukku, Chairman & CEO, I-Flex Solutions
Indian Government & Government Institutions
- Prithviraj Chavan - Minister of State, Prime Ministers Office, Government of India (2004 onwards)
- RK Arora - Former Executive Director / Head of CDAC, Inventors of the PARAM Supercomputer
- SN Zindal - Chairman, Software Technology Parks of India
Well Known Corporate Leaders
- Shivan Subramanian, Chairman & CEO of FM Global, $3 billion commercial and property insurance company in the US
- Vivek Paul, Vice Chairman of Wipro Ltd. & CEO, Wipro Technologies - Named one of the world's 10 best managers by Businessweek in 2003
- Rajesh Hukku, Chairman & CEO, I-Flex Solutions - Named Star of Asia, Businessweek 2003
- Prem Jain, Senior Vice President, Cisco Systems, founder of Crescendo, sold to Cisco for $90 million
- Gunendar Kapoor, Board of Directors & Head of Foods Division, Hindustan Lever Ltd.
- Sunil Duggal, CEO of Dabur Group
- Rakesh Kalra, CEO of Eicher Motors
- Baba Kalyani, CEO of Bharat Forge
Well Known Entrepreneurs
- Sabeer Bhatia - Founder of Hotmail (sold to Microsoft for $400 million), transferred to Caltech after two years.
- Mukesh Chatter - Founder of Axiowave and Nextabit (sold to Lucent for $900 million)
- Jayan Ramankutty - Co-founder of Lara Systems (sold to Cypress Semiconductor for $250 million)
- Ajay Chopra - Founder & Chairman of Pinnacle Systems ($300 million NASDAQ traded company: PCLE)
- Vinod Agarwal - Founder & Chairman of LogicVision ($100 million NASDAQ traded company: LGVN)
- Diaz Nesamoney Co-Founder, Informatica ($500 million NASDAQ traded company) and Founder, Celequest
- Manoj Saxena Founder, Chairman and CEO, Webify Solutions Inc. Founder, Exterprise (sold to CommerceOne for $60 million)
- Dr K R V Subramanian Founder & CEO, Ascendum Systems Pvt Ltd, a Global technology service provider
NGO's
- Matthew Cherian CEO, Help Age India
Well Known Professors
- Dr. Krishna Saraswat, Stanford University
- Dr. S. P. Kothari, Head of Dept of Economics, Finance & Accounting, MIT Sloan
- Dr. D. P. Kothari, Director-in-charge, IIT Delhi
Well Known Writers
- Shashi Warrior - Writer of fiction
- Dilip D'Souza - Writer of social causes
Well Known Movie Stars & Directors
- Mani Shankar - Hindi Movie Director
- Divya - Telegu Movie Actress
- Anu Hasan - Telegu / Tamil Movie Actress
- Padmini Chettur - Dancer
External links
- Official Home Page - http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in/
- BITS Alumni Association - http://www.bitsaa.org
- BITSAA Home - http://www.bits-pilani.ac.in:12346/bitsaa/index.htm
- BITS, Pilani - Dubai Campus - http://www.bitsdubai.com