Top Left Photo: Prof Preeti Aghalayam (5thfrom left), Director-in-charge, Zanzibar campus, IIT Madras & Prof Raghunathan Rengaswamy (3rd  from right), Dean, IIT-M with faculty and friends.
Chennai, July  10 2023:  The Indian Institute of Technology, Madras has become the first IIT in the country to launch an international campus, which is coming up in Zanzibar-Tanzania.
An MoU was recently signed between India and Tanzania, the final procedural step that paves the way for this campus.
Zanzibar Campus, IIT Madras (https://www.iitm.ac.in/zanzibar/) will be located in Zanzibar Island, off the East African mainland and is being planned as a unique and game-changing educational partnership between India and Zanzibar-Tanzania.
The faculty will be deputed from IIT Madras or recruited from India during the initial days of this campus. Activities to ensure local talent is developed and can be employed as faculty are underway already. The Government of India is offering numerous scholarships for citizens of Tanzania/Zanzibar to study in various degree programs at IIT Madras in Chennai, starting from July 2023.
Prof. . V. Kamakoti, Director, IIT Madras, said, “It is indeed a major milestone in this history of IIT Madras that we are establishing a Campus at Zanzibar. Through this, we look forward to active participation in the future higher education initiatives at Zanzibar.”
Classes for the first Academic Year (2023-24) are scheduled to commence in October 2023, offering two full-time academic programs – A four-year Bachelor of Science in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence and a two-year Master of Technology in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. The total student intake will be 70. Applications for 2023 batch are currently open.
Prof. Raghunathan Rengaswamy, Dean (Global Engagement), IIT Madras, said, “This is the most significant step forward in the internationalization efforts of IIT Madras. A detailed strategic plan that includes increasing the number of international students, fostering meaningful and synergistic joint degree programs with international academic institutions and enhancing faculty/student mobility has been laid out by us. Opportunities for a full-fledged physical campus abroad were being strongly explored and it is heartening to see the realization of these ambitions”
Prof. Preeti Aghalayam, Dean of School of Science & Engineering & Director-in-charge, Zanzibar campus, IIT Madras, said, “IIT Madras is proud to bring its deep and long-term education and research strengths to East Africa. The campus is planned in similar terms as Madras, with verdant natural surroundings, state-of-the-art classrooms, laboratories, research facilities, and innovation centres.”
The IITM Zanzibar campus is planned to have a structure with degree programs hosted by schools. The first school is the School of Science and Engineering, which will host both the planned degrees for 2023-’24 academic year. A detailed evolution plan for academic programs is under development, with inputs from expert members in India and Zanzibar/Tanzania.