India: IIT-K considers giving admission to students qualifying math olympiads

IIT Kanpur

Kanpur: The IIT Kanpur reportedly considers offering admissions to students who have participated in internationally renowned olympiads directly based on their performance in the competition.

It is planning to retain those talented students by offering them an alternative mode of admission.

Students qualifying for Olympiads can apply to the department of their specialised subjects. However, the decision-making bodies of different departments of the IIT are yet to finalise on the decision.

The IIT has introduced an alternative mechanism based on principal agreement. There is no guarantee regarding admission of these candidates, said Nitin Saxena, chairperson of undergraduate academic programme review committee at IIT Kanpur.

In an interview he said, various steps will be considered to assure the entry of the most qualified candidates into the august institute through this route.

In the year 2018, IIT-Bombay had allowed candidates qualifying for the international mathematics olympiad to be eligible to apply for the BSc mathematics course.

Olympiads are niche tests that assess students based on different in-depth knowledge in a particular subject.

For olympiads, however, only a limited few apply.