Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, this year, is to welcome its first batch of 22 students in the diploma programme in Metro rail transport technology and management, sponsored by Delhi Metro Rail Corporation. In another development, IIT-D has started a remote classroom to deliver postgraduate level instructions to students in Ethiopia. The instruction will be given in four engineering disciplines to students of Adis Ababa University. The four programmes, construction technology and management, chemical engineering, electronics and computer engineering and manufacturing engineering, were started in the last academic year. There are about 50 students in each programme, which is taught using two-way video/audio link. Said director IIT Surendra Prasad, 'A dedicated line has been set up for this purpose. Two delivery rooms have been equipped with video-conferencing facilities and recording of lectures.' The new school of biological sciences has also started functioning. It was told by Prasad, that there has been a 23% increase in the number of PhD. Degrees that will be given out this year.
