India's Education Legacy in the Al Era

Exclusive Interview with Prof. Sandeep K. Shukla, Director, IIIT Hyderabad

- 

India's premier institutes are not just centers of learning, but the driving force behind shaping the nation's future and powering its global tech revolution.

As India accelerates toward digital sovereignty and global leadership in AI, cybersecurity, semiconductors, and next-gen technologies, the role of academia in driving deep-tech innovation has never been more critical.

IIIT Hyderabad, long regarded as one of the pioneers of interdisciplinary research, continues to stand at the forefront of this transformation. In this conversation, Prof. Sandeep K. Shukla, who joined IIIT Hyderabad on August 20 as the Director, shares his early impressions, insights on the institute's unique research ecosystem, and his vision for shaping engineering education to meet the demands of the Al era.

IIIT-H has often been described as a crucible of deep-tech research. What are some of the unique interdisciplinary projects spanning AI, ML, cybersecurity, semiconductors, and other frontier technologies that truly differentiate the institute from its peers?

I joined IIITH on August 4 as a Professor and took over as the Director just last week. Over the past three weeks, I have been engaging closely with faculty, research centers, and labs, and while I am still in the process of gaining a complete perspective, certain strengths are already evident.

Interdisciplinarity is deeply embedded in IIITH's DNA, thanks to its unique structure of research centers rather than traditional departments. These span Computational Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Humanities, Robotics, Computer Vision, Language Technologies, and Quantum Sciences, creating a natural environment for cross-center collaboration.