TU Delft delegation visits India

In October 2023, President of the Executive Board and Rector Magnificus Tim van der Hagen, led a delegation to New Delhi, Bengaluru and Mumbai. Building on many years of strong Indo-Dutch collaboration, the aim of the visit was to strengthen TU Delft’s ties with Indian partner universities even further, and enable researchers to take collaborations with Indian partners to a higher level. Pro-Vice Rector International Affairs Professor Ena Voûte and TU Delft Ambassador India Professor Jenny Dankelman also joined the delegation.

Tim van der Hagen: “At TU Delft we have a mission to create positive societal impact; our collaboration with our esteemed partners in India amplifies our reach and resonance. These partnerships, which stretch back more than a decade, include successful joint efforts in such fields as clean water and sanitation, climate action, and resilient cities. The delegation to India provided an opportunity to foster the international cooperation of bright minds and take a further step towards delivering innovation with a positive impact for our local communities.”

Delhi

First stop was Delhi for a visit to the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT D). IIT D and TU Delft have collaborated on a structural basis for over ten years, and in 2022 the TU Delft signed a new cooperation agreement that included a joint seed fund call to support collaborative and interdisciplinary education and research activities that should lead to impactful research outcomes. With IIT D Director Prof. Rangan Banerjee, Dean International Programs Prof. James Gomes, and Dean Research & Development Prof. Naresh Bhatnagar, it was discussed how collaboration could be further strengthened via such avenues as student mobility, co-supervision of MSc and PhD students, structured faculty exchange and continued seed funding. Professor van der Hagen and Professor Banerjee agreed that it is important to identify bilateral opportunities, to build on bottom-up collaborations initiated by the top talents hosted at each institution and the value in offering multicultural experiences to students.

The delegation then met Prof. Ajay Kumar Sood, Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, and Dr. Parvinder Maini, Scientific Secretary, Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India to deliberate on India’s new National Research Foundation and explore collaborations between India and Netherlands on such topics as open science research funding, and quantum technology. In a meeting with Professor Srinivas, Director of Director of AIIMS (All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi), the delegation discussed health collaborations.

Bangalore

The delegation then moved to Bangalore where a full agenda included visits to the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)’s National Aerospace Laboratories and the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. With, the Director of CSIR NAR, Dr Abhay A Pashilkar and Dr CM Ananda, Program Director of Civil Aircraft Program, potential collaboration areas including advanced materials and sustainable propulsion were reviewed. 

At IISc, meetings with the Director Prof. Govindan Rangarajan, Dean Navakanta Bhat, Dean Usha Vijayraghavan and Prof. Abhishek Kumar Singh, Chair, Office of International Relations, focused on furthering our strong decade-long collaboration. IISc and TU Delft currently have a seed fund call together, and new opportunities were explored, especially relating to the large Medical School focused on clinical research and medical technology that will open next year on IISc campus. Both sides noted our shared enthusiasm and urge to make the world a better place and that modes of collaboration like matching co-supervision are well suited to bringing this vision to fruition. There was also time to visit several impressive lab facilities on campus including the Robert Bosch Centre for Cyber-Physical Systems, the Combustion Gasification & Propulsion Laboratory, the National Nanofabrication Centre, and the AI & Robotics Technology Park (ARTPark).

Mumbai

In Mumbai, TU Delft signed a MoU with a new Indian partner, the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT B). The signing of the agreement with IIT Bombay will support the development of joint projects in such areas as urbanism, water management and negative emissions. With IIT B Director Prof Subhasis Chaudhuri, Deputy Director Finance and External Affairs Prof. K V Krishna Rao and Dean International Relations, Prof. Amit Agrawal, the delegation talked about methods to bring researchers together such as research workshops for matchmaking in new fields, student and staff exchange and a potential seed fund to strengthen existing collaborations. On IIT Bombay’s campus, the delegation also visited the Society for Incubation & Entrepreneurship (SINE), India’s oldest academic incubator, and the IIT Bombay Nanofabrication Facility.

Alumni:

The Netherlands Ambassador to India, Marisa Gerards, hosted an alumni meeting for the delegation in Delhi, where TU Delft alumni shared good memories as well as success stories.  The delegation was welcomed in Bangalore by the Consul General Ewout de Wit, and at the alumni event hosted locally, TU Delft alumnus Jitendra Singh of the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering gave a presentation on the alumni experience and dancer Avani performed a traditional Indian dance. To wrap up the visit, Bart de Jong, the Consul General in Mumbai, hosted TU Delft alumni and the delegation. Overall, over 150 alumni joined for the three events in Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai.

University Ambassador India, Prof. Jenny Dankelman summed up the visit “as a great success. It was a full programme with many in depth research discussions, discussions on new areas for TU Delft-India collaborations and meetings with alumni. Everybody was convinced that we should continue to further strengthen the relation between TU Delft and India in the coming years.” Pro-Vice Rector International Affairs Ena Voute added, “it was a pleasure and insightful to get a better feeling for the strengths of India and our partner institutions as well as understanding the local challenges well reflected in the SDGs.”