NEW DELHI: Dr M Jagadesh Kumar, professor of electrical engineering at IIT Delhi, is set to be the new vice-chancellor of the prestigious Jawaharlal Lal Nehru University. His name was cleared by President Pranab Mukherjee who is the Visitor to the central university, sources in the Human Resource Development Ministry said.
Earlier this month, the search-cum-selection panel had shortlisted Professor Kumar’s name along with R N K Bamezai, who is a professor of human genetics at the School of Life Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and Professor Virendra Singh Chauhan, who is a leading researcher on malaria.
The selection process was keenly watched as it had kicked up a storm over allegations from a few academicians, including an applicant who has withdrawn from the race, accusing the panel of favouring a few persons, overlooking merit.
According to Prof Kumar’s homepage, he obtained his MS(EE) and PhD(EE) degrees from the Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. A self-confessed Karate and gym expert, Kumar was born in Mamidala, Nalgonda district, Telangana.
From 1991 to 1994, he did post-doctoral research at Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Professor Kumar is currently the NXP (Philips) Chair Professor at IIT Delhi, a chair established by Philips Semiconductors, Netherlands.
He is also the Chief Investigator of the Nano-scale Research Facility (NRF) being built at IIT Delhi at a cost of USD 10 million.
The professor is a Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, The National Academy of Sciences, India, and The Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers, India. He has been awarded the 29th IETE Ram Lal Wadhwa Gold Medal for distinguished contribution in the field of Semiconductor device design and modeling. He has received the first ever ISA-VSI Techno Mentor Award given by the India Semiconductor Association to recognise a distinguished Indian academician and researcher for playing a significant role as a mentor and researcher.
Kumar was also the Organising Chairman of the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) 2012 with the overall responsibility of organising the test across India in 860 centres spread over 170 cities/towns.