Among the 53 students who won medals during the convocation ceremony at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), many have already landed jobs in both private and public sectors. From geo-sciences to data sciences, the expertise of these medal winners has a wide range. While expressing extreme fondness about their time at the premier institution, they displayed equal enthusiasm about their futures ahead.
Mondal Saankhya Subrata who pursued an M. Tech in Artificial Intelligence, secured the Prof. Sargu N. Srihari medal. Speaking about what makes IISc great, he said “It has been a very good experience especially the way courses are. They allow us to go into the depth of the concepts. That is the one thing that differentiates IISc from most of the other colleges.” Hailing from Nasik in Maharashtra, Mr. Subrata is currently working as a data scientist at Ernst and Young GDS. He plans on pursuing sports analytics in the future.
Many parents of graduating students had travelled from different parts of the country to be present during the convocation. For Lokireddy Pushya Susritha Reddy from Hyderabad, who won the Prof. N. S. Lakshmana Rao medal, her parents were her biggest support system along with her friends. After completing her M. Tech in civil engineering at IISc, she is working as a scientific officer at the Department of Atomic Energy. She said that she might possibly get a Ph.D. next.
Coming from West Bengal, for Obaidur Rahaman, who received the Prof. N.S. Govinda Rao medal upon completion of his Ph.D. from the Civil Engineering Department, time spent at IISc was the best moment of his life. “I spent five years here and it was very nice. Be it the environment, lab, mess, food, or hostels, I had a good experience,” he said.
While his Ph.D. was in geo-technical engineering, he is working as an assistant professor at Jadavpur University in Kolkata now. “From my undergraduate days, I was interested in academics and that is why I pursued masters and Ph.D. After the completion of three years at my job, I will apply for a post-doctoral fellowship,” Mr. Rahaman said.
Among the six undergraduate students who secured medals was city-based Nikhita Kirthivasan. She received the Krothapalli Satyanarayana and Vimaladevi Medal and her major subject was biology. She told The Hindu that she was going to University of California San Fransisco (UCSF) for a Ph.D. in the biomedical science programme. “I am actually interested in immunology because I am fascinated by how immune cells work with other cells in the body. I want to help unravel more on the subject,” she said.
