Week 45 · 2 to 8 November 2026 · The IIT week
In the QS Asia University Rankings 2027, released on 3 November, all six of India's highest-ranked institutions slipped, and IIT Delhi, still the best placed, fell from 59th to 66th. QS says most of them did not get worse: Asia got more crowded.
The same week, a recruiter posting on r/iitmadras said their company had set aside about 150 test scores above 90 per cent as too good to trust, IIT Delhi promised an independent ombudsperson and more counsellors after an inquiry into a student's death, and 13,349 aspirants asked for a third shot at JEE Advanced. This was a week about how the IITs get measured, and who does the measuring. It also had a win: an IIT Guwahati team beat 802 others to take the Lam Research Challenge, with IIT Ropar second.
QS Asia University Rankings 2027: every top IIT fell
TL;DR: IIT Delhi 66th, IIT Bombay 83rd, IIT Madras 85th, IIT Kharagpur 90th, IIT Kanpur 97th. No Indian institution is in Asia's top 50 for a second year. IIT Hyderabad, IIT BHU and IIT (ISM) Dhanbad climbed.
QS published its Asia table on Tuesday, 3 November. India has 325 ranked institutions, second only to mainland China, and 71 per cent of them fell, 18 per cent rose and 11 per cent held. The fall reached the top: IIT Delhi went from 59th to 66th, IISc Bangalore from 64th to 79th, IIT Bombay from 71st to 83rd and IIT Madras from 70th to 85th. IIT Kanpur's fall of 20 places, from 77th to 97th, was the joint-largest inside the top 200.
| Institution | QS Asia 2027 | QS Asia 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| IIT Delhi | 66 | 59 | down 7 |
| IIT Bombay | 83 | 71 | down 12 |
| IIT Madras | 85 | 70 | down 15 |
| IIT Kharagpur | 90 | 77 | down 13 |
| IIT Kanpur | 97 | 77 | down 20 |
| IIT Guwahati | 120 | 115 | down 5 |
| IIT Roorkee | 124 | 114 | down 10 |
| IIT (BHU) Varanasi | 219 | 237 | up 18 |
| IIT Hyderabad | 251 | 270 | up 19 |
| IIT (ISM) Dhanbad | 373 | not given | up 51 |
Ranks from QS World University Rankings: Asia 2027 as tabulated by Indian Express (3 Nov); IIT Hyderabad also from Careers360. IISc (79th, from 64th) is not an IIT and is left out of the table. The full list is on QS.
QS's own reading is that this is mostly about competition. Ben Sowter, a senior vice president at QS, told Indian Express that "two-thirds of the Indian universities that dropped in rank improved their overall scores, while leading institutions such as IIT Bombay, IIT Delhi and IISc broadly maintained them." QS added 195 new universities across Asia this year, and near the top of the table fewer than five points separate institutions thirty places apart.
The indicators show where the ground went. Academic reputation, 30 per cent of the score, fell for 76 per cent of Indian universities, and employer reputation fell for 83 per cent. International students and exchange numbers fell for 85 to 91 per cent. The one bright line was research volume: Papers per Faculty was the only indicator in which more Indian universities rose than fell. Employer reputation is still strong at the top: IIT Bombay is seventh in Asia on it and IIT Delhi tenth.
What this means for you: if you are choosing between IITs, a 12-place move in QS Asia says little about your department. The drops come from surveys of academics and employers across Asia, and from an international-student indicator that fell for 85 per cent of Indian universities. In our reading, none of that reflects a change in a classroom this year. Three IITs gained: IIT Hyderabad rose 19 places to 251st (Careers360), IIT (BHU) Varanasi 18 places to 219th and IIT (ISM) Dhanbad 51 places to 373rd (Indian Express). For the world table and the IITs that sit out of THE, see our IIT rankings in QS World 2027.
Student wins this week: IIT Guwahati takes the Lam Research Challenge
TL;DR: IIT Guwahati first and IIT Ropar second among 803 teams; IIT Palakkad picks up an Autodesk award for teaching construction on its own building sites; two IIT BHU scholars win at HABIT-2026.
The Lam Research Challenge 2026, run by the chip-equipment maker, drew 803 teams from 189 colleges. At the final in Bengaluru, the IIT Guwahati team of Suhani Maheswari (Electronics and Communication), Aakash Kumar Meena (Mechanical), Shrut Jain and Kummari Premaja (Electrical and Electronics) came first. "IIT Ropar secured the runner-up position, while NIT Calicut finished third." The top teams shared ₹10 lakh, and select participants also get internships at Lam (The Hans India also reported the result).
| Who | IIT | What | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Suhani Maheswari, Aakash Kumar Meena, Shrut Jain, Kummari Premaja | IIT Guwahati | Won the Lam Research Challenge 2026 (803 teams); prize pool ₹10 lakh shared with runners-up | Education Times, 7 Nov |
| Team from IIT Ropar | IIT Ropar | Runner-up, Lam Research Challenge 2026 | Education Times, 7 Nov |
| "Campus as a Classroom", led by Prof V. Senthilkumar | IIT Palakkad | One of 25 winners of a 2026 Autodesk Design & Make Award, Education Excellence | IIT Palakkad news page |
| Amar Jeet Yadav, PhD scholar, Biochemical Engineering | IIT (BHU) Varanasi | Young Scientist Award at HABIT-2026; a second BHU scholar won a poster award | TOI, 6 Nov |
| Prashant Chaudhary, with Priyanka Sethi and Rakesh Sehgal | IIT Delhi alumni | Fifth Rohini Nayyar Award (₹10 lakh) for CodeYogi, presented 31 Oct | Bhaskar English, 3 Nov |
IIT Palakkad's award is worth reading past the headline. The institute says the Autodesk programme drew more than 280 submissions and named 25 winners; the award recognised its "Campus as a Classroom" initiative in construction education (IIT Palakkad). News outlets have not picked it up; the institute's page links to Autodesk's own winner announcement. At IIT Bhubaneswar, the student fest Tech Zephyr 4.0 closed on 1 November with more than 600 participants.
Placement tests are being gamed, and a recruiter just said so out loud
TL;DR: Weeks before placement season, a hiring manager on r/iitmadras said their company set aside every candidate who scored over 90% in its test. Students at IIT Delhi, IIT Kharagpur and IIT BHU posted similar complaints.
The most-read IIT post of the week was not news coverage. On 4 November, a user who said they were an alumnus and a hiring manager wrote on r/iitmadras that their company's one-hour online test usually produces hires at 50 to 70 per cent. This year, "About 150 people scored above 90% marks." Their conclusion: "This has led us to entirely remove from the pipeline the students who scored about 90%. Because that is a very low trust batch of students." The post had 397 upvotes and 122 comments by Sunday. The company is not named and the claim is unverified.
"what’s worse than the cheating itself is that CTM had it on video and still nothing happened."
A student on r/IITDelhi, 4 November, in a thread asking whether someone used remote-desktop software in an Amazon online assessment
Similar threads appeared on r/iitkgp (asking the career development centre to act) and r/iitbhu, where a post accused a student placement representative of cheating. We are not repeating that allegation. On r/iitg, students asked why Accenture's test had been postponed across IITs, and nobody had an answer.
Why it matters: online assessments are how most students get shortlisted. If a recruiter stops trusting top scores, honest students who score high lose too. Pay rose over the last decade: an Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister study found the median IIT salary across 17 IITs went from ₹8.80 lakh in 2015-16 to ₹19.08 lakh in 2023-24. For what each IIT reported last season, see our IIT placements 2026 guide.
IIT Delhi promises an ombudsperson and more counsellors, but keeps the inquiry report shut
TL;DR: After an external inquiry into a student's death in August, IIT Delhi will appoint an independent Student Grievance Ombudsperson, hire more psychologists and counsellors, and make empathy workshops compulsory for staff. The report stays confidential.
IIT Delhi announced the measures on Wednesday, 4 November, after discussing them at a Student Affairs Council meeting on 3 November. The inquiry committee was chaired by retired Delhi High Court judge Justice Mukta Gupta and included an AIIMS expert and two student representatives. The plan includes additional full-time clinical psychologists and counsellors, visiting psychiatrists, and "An independent Student Grievance Ombudsperson will also be instituted to strengthen the grievance redressal mechanism." (India Today). The institute calls the plan time-bound but has published no dates, and the report itself will remain confidential, as the panel asked.
The gap is large across the system. An analysis of RTI replies from 16 IITs, reported by Deccan Herald on 2 November, found most IITs miss the recommended counsellor-to-student ratio, some with more than 1,000 students for each mental-health professional; it named IIT Ropar, IIT Dharwad and IIT Indore as the ones that meet it. The institutes counted staff differently, so the ratios may not be strictly comparable. The analysis was done by an individual alumnus, not an official body, and no second outlet has published the figures.
At IIT Bombay, where student Sahil Wakode died on 18 September, the institute has formed an eight-member committee of four faculty and four students to review exam rules and penalties, and is surveying students on why they think cheating happens. His parents asked for a forensic check of an apology letter they say he did not write (TOI, 3 Nov), and Rahul Gandhi met them on 5 November (PTI via ThePrint). The family alleges caste discrimination; the institute has denied it. Separately, RTI replies obtained by an alumnus and shared with Careers360 show 2,508 SC, ST and OBC faculty posts vacant across 17 IITs.
If you or someone you know is struggling, Tele MANAS is free and open 24/7 on 14416.
JEE Advanced third attempt: 13,349 signatures, no decision, and dates still unannounced
TL;DR: A student petition asks for three JEE Advanced attempts, or two within three years. Nothing official has changed. A similar change was approved two years ago and withdrawn within a fortnight.
The petition asks the Joint Admission Board, the IIT Council and the Ministry of Education to either allow three attempts in three consecutive years or permit two attempts within a three-year window. The New Indian Express reported on 7 November that 13,349 had signed; Moneycontrol's headline said more than 13,500. A student leader of the campaign, Raj Aryan, told TNIE: "We have already met officials in the Education Ministry twice in August and September and handed over the petition seeking a policy change."
For context, 1,79,694 candidates sat JEE Advanced 2026 and 56,880 qualified. TNIE also notes "A proposal on similar lines got the nod two years ago but was withdrawn within a fortnight." What to watch: the JEE Advanced 2027 date. The last three were announced between November 24 and December 5, so the information brochure, which would settle the attempt rule for 2027, is likely within a month. Until then, the rule is two attempts in consecutive years.
An IIT Madras start-up is lowest bidder on a ₹32,000 crore warship programme
TL;DR: AstraYAN, incubated at IIT Madras, came in L1 for propulsion integration on five Navy corvettes; the Air Force signed with IIT Madras on secure airborne communications; Saint-Gobain is funding two labs for ₹3.8 crore.
BusinessLine reported on 3 November that AstraYAN emerged L1, the lowest bidder, for the propulsion system integration of five Next Generation Corvettes that Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers will build for the Navy at a cost of ₹32,000 crore. L1 is not a contract: price negotiation was expected to take at least a month. On 6 November, the Air Force's Software Development Institute signed an agreement with IIT Madras and IITM Pravartak for an indigenous secure communication system for aircraft (Swarajya).
The civilian side was busy too. Saint-Gobain's ₹3.8 crore, three-year grant sets up two labs for sensing and concrete research at the institute's low-carbon construction centre, and the Tamil Nadu government picked IIT Madras on 5 November to run the project monitoring unit for a state AI data centre. IIT Madras advises on that one; it is not building the data centre.
IIT Hyderabad graduates its first nuclear class and wants a reactor on campus
TL;DR: 23 engineers finished ANUGYAN, a three-month residential nuclear programme run with Crimson Energy Experts. The director says the institute plans a micro reactor on campus, like some German and French universities.
The first ANUGYAN batch received certificates on Monday, 2 November: 23 engineers and industry professionals, after a three-month residential course. Director B S Murthy said the institute is planning a nuclear micro reactor on campus, like those at some universities in Germany and France, Hyderabad Mail reported. No approval or timeline was given, so read this as a stated plan. The institute is also starting a three-month Forward Deployed Engineering programme for working professionals on 5 December.
Research this week: a heart-disease protein, a brain-tumour lead and 36,000 vehicles
TL;DR: Six results from six IITs, most of them outside the big five. None is a cure or a product yet; each line says how far along it is.
- IIT Dharwad: A team led by Prof Badri Dubey mapped the previously unresolved core of ROCK, a protein linked to high blood pressure and pulmonary hypertension, in Communications Chemistry (online 4 Nov). The structure is a starting point for better drugs, not a drug (TOI).
- IIT Gandhinagar: Two compounds, SPK17 and SPK17b, killed brain-tumour cells resistant to the standard drug temozolomide in lab cell lines (institute release, 6 Nov; paper in the Journal of Biological Chemistry). Animal studies are next.
- IIT Guwahati: Prof Akhilesh K Maurya's group used drone video of more than 36,000 vehicles on a Delhi highway to test how well textbook traffic models fit mixed Indian traffic (India Today NE; Down To Earth). The paper came out in April; the coverage is this week.
- IIT Roorkee: A new spring in Unchaun village, Tehri Garhwal, has doubled lean-season drinking water from about 500 to over 1,000 litres a day, built on two Himalayan spring studies (TOI; India Today).
- IIT (ISM) Dhanbad: Patent 608403, granted 4 November, for an air-cooled lithium-ion battery-pack cooling system by four Mechanical Engineering researchers (TOI).
- IIT Kanpur and IIT Delhi: IIT Kanpur patented a bamboo-filled underground barrier that damps ground vibration and has put it up for licensing; IIT Delhi and DRDO developed a 2.2 kg firefighting suit rated to 1,300°C. The suit is DRDO-certified and in the technology-transfer stage, with market entry expected in a couple of years (ETV Bharat).
Also: IIT Jodhpur described an AI platform for damaged manuscripts, and IIT Bombay's viscosity-based screening test (a screening tool, not a diagnosis) picked out 95.1 per cent of severe anaemia cases in 516 people from tribal Maharashtra.
Careers Watch: an IIT Roorkee IPO, a Guwahati batch of 2022, and Walmart at IIT Delhi
TL;DR: The money this week went to companies that hire engineers who build physical and financial plumbing: payments, robots, drones, soil sensors. One consumer app made the list.
| Company / deal | IIT link | What happened | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Razorpay | Founders Harshil Mathur and Shashank Kumar, IIT Roorkee | SEBI has reportedly cleared its IPO; reported size ₹5,000 to 6,000 crore at about $5 billion, listing likely in Q4 FY27 (unnamed sources) | Moneycontrol, BusinessLine |
| Matiks | Three founders, IIT Guwahati class of 2022 | $10 million pre-Series A led by General Catalyst | India Today, 2 Nov |
| Peppermint Robotics | Founded out of SINE, IIT Bombay's incubator | ₹100 crore pre-Series B led by pi Ventures and Crane Venture Partners | Entrackr, ET |
| ScaNxt | Incubated at IIT Kanpur | Undisclosed sum from Rainmatter, SIDBI and Exim Bank for a soil-testing device | TOI, 6 Nov |
| Cellegant Energy Systems | Founded by IIT Gandhinagar professor Atul Bhargav | ₹2.61 crore for hydrogen drone drivetrains; IIT Gandhinagar's incubator invested | BW Auto World |
| Yardi School of AI x Walmart Global Tech | IIT Delhi | About ₹9 crore over four years for AI research and fellowships | Tribune, 7 Nov |
The hiring read: three of the six build hardware: robots, drones and a soil sensor, and a fourth is AI research money. Razorpay's listing, if it happens, is the one to watch: it would put one of the biggest IIT-founded employers on the stock market. We profiled its founders in Harshil Mathur: IIT Roorkee to Razorpay. IIT Guwahati added a PhD fellowship with the Centre for High Technology that pays 25% above standard stipends. IIT Bombay's incubator, SINE, opened a national hub-and-spoke network with SINE as the hub and Nagpur as the first region it covers.
Tonight's profile is about the oldest IIT-founded giant: Narayana Murthy: IIT Rank 17, IIT Kanpur and Infosys.
Exam dates that moved this week
- GATE 2027: IIT Madras extended the deadline to fix scrutiny defects in applications, without a fee, to 30 November 2026 (it was 3 November; EdexLive). The exam stays on 6, 7, 13, 14, 20 and 21 February.
- UCEED and CEED 2027: Regular-fee registration closed on 5 November; the late-fee window shuts at 5 pm on 10 November (UCEED, CEED).
- CAT 2026: Admit cards are out; the test is on 29 November in three sessions (iimcat.ac.in).
- JEE Advanced 2027: No date yet. See the third-attempt story above.
The trend: the IITs are being graded by people who are not in the room
Most of what moved this week was a judgement made about the IITs by someone else. QS weights surveys of academics and employers across Asia at half the score, and India's reputation numbers fell even though, QS says, IIT Bombay, IIT Delhi and IISc broadly maintained their overall scores. An anonymous recruiter stopped trusting top test scores. A counsellor ratio recommended from outside is missed at most IITs. Where the IITs set the rules themselves, as IIT Delhi and IIT Bombay did this week and as the IIT-run Joint Admission Board does on attempts, change is slower and comes with fewer dates.
The pattern that holds: what the IITs produce themselves, papers, patents, grants and start-up rounds, had a good week. What others think of them, reputation, trust in a test score, student support, did not. If you are a student, the second set is where recruiters and rankings judge your degree.
What students said on Reddit
- r/iitmadras: The hiring-manager post on cheating in online tests (397 upvotes). Top reply: "well you guys only see cgpa and test scores so obviously people will cheat anyways,"
- r/IITDelhi: These iits don’t even give proper holiday for diwali (69 upvotes). One reply: "It's first diwali I'm away from my family.😭😭"
- r/iitkgp: Please stop cheating in placements!! with the reply "until the students are removed form controlling the placements and super stict attendance happens"
Reddit posts are anonymous and unverified; quotes are reproduced as written, including spelling.
Across the 23 IITs this week
One line for every IIT, including the ones that had nothing to report.
Older IITs (Bombay to Kharagpur)
- IIT Bombay: 83rd in QS Asia; exam-rules committee and cheating survey; Peppermint Robotics raised ₹100 crore; Tarkeshwar Patil got his patent after a Bombay High Court order ended a 13-year dispute with the institute (Moneycontrol).
- IIT Delhi: 66th in QS Asia; ombudsperson and counsellor plan; ₹9 crore Walmart AI tie-up; DRDO firefighting suit.
- IIT Madras: AstraYAN L1 on the corvette programme, an Air Force secure-communications agreement, Saint-Gobain labs, and the Tamil Nadu AI data-centre unit.
- IIT Kanpur: Fell 20 places to 97th in QS Asia; marked its 67th Foundation Day with 23 awards; bamboo vibration-barrier patent; ScaNxt funding.
- IIT Kharagpur: 90th in QS Asia. Director Suman Chakraborty was elected a Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences from 1 January 2027 (PIB); its Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law's MoU with the Law Commission, signed on 22 October, was reported (LiveLaw).
Second-generation IITs (Roorkee to Dhanbad)
- IIT Roorkee: 124th in QS Asia; the Tehri spring; Razorpay, founded by two alumni, has reportedly been cleared for its IPO.
- IIT Guwahati: Won the Lam Research Challenge; drone traffic study; CHT PhD fellowship; Matiks, founded by 2022 graduates, raised $10 million.
- IIT (BHU) Varanasi: Up 18 places to 219th in QS Asia; Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman released a ₹250 coin for Muthuswami Dikshitar at an IIT BHU event; HABIT-2026 awards.
- IIT Hyderabad: Up 19 to 251st in QS Asia; first nuclear batch and a micro-reactor plan; a professional programme from 5 December.
- IIT Indore: Quiet week: the institute site and news searches turned up only recruitment notices.
- IIT Bhubaneswar: Tech Zephyr 4.0 closed on 1 November with more than 600 participants.
- IIT Gandhinagar: The glioblastoma compounds; Cellegant raised ₹2.61 crore.
- IIT Ropar: Second in the Lam Research Challenge; hosted the launch of a white paper on measuring wisdom in AI and opened a centre for yogic sciences; INNOpreneur 2026 on 3 November.
- IIT Jodhpur: The manuscript-reading AI platform; a diagnostics research centre with ICMR-NIHR Jodhpur was reported by a trade outlet.
- IIT Mandi: Its director described a Himalayan disaster-research push and the Tata Trusts-funded climate and disaster centre.
- IIT Patna: The row over social-media posts attributed to the registrar went to a police station and the Education Ministry, per The Mooknayak; he denies the posts are his, and the institute said in October that the matter was with higher authorities.
- IIT (ISM) Dhanbad: Up 51 places to 373rd in QS Asia; its TEXMiN park signed a statement of intent with NITI Aayog on critical minerals and a rare-earth magnet tie-up with Magnora; battery-cooling patent.
Newest IITs (Bhilai, Dharwad, Jammu, Palakkad, Goa, Tirupati)
- IIT Bhilai: Quiet week: the institute site and news searches turned up only recruitment and a PhD scheme call.
- IIT Dharwad: The ROCK protein structure in Communications Chemistry; named in the RTI analysis as one of three IITs meeting the counsellor ratio.
- IIT Jammu: Signed an MoU with CMTI Bengaluru on advanced manufacturing on 4 November.
- IIT Palakkad: The Autodesk Design & Make award; hosted a 50-member Yuva Sangam team from Uttar Pradesh.
- IIT Goa: A professor's exam paper built to resist AI went viral on X; some users questioned its authenticity and we found no statement from the institute (News9). A sustainability conclave is listed for 14 November on its site.
- IIT Tirupati: Quiet week: the institute site and news searches turned up only recruitment notices.
Coming next
- 10 Nov, 5 pm: UCEED and CEED 2027 late-fee registration closes (UCEED).
- 14 Nov: IIT Goa sustainability conclave (IIT Goa).
- 22 Nov: JEE Main 2027 Session 1 applications close (NTA).
- 24 Nov to 5 Dec (expected): JEE Advanced 2027 date, going by the last three years (EdexLive).
- 29 Nov: CAT 2026 (iimcat.ac.in).
- 30 Nov: GATE 2027 application defect correction closes (GATE 2027).
- 5 Dec: IIT Hyderabad's Forward Deployed Engineering programme starts (The Hans India). 21 to 24 Dec: Mood Indigo at IIT Bombay (Jagran Josh).
FAQ
Which IIT is ranked highest in the QS Asia University Rankings 2027?
IIT Delhi, at 66th, down from 59th last year. It is followed among IITs by IIT Bombay (83rd), IIT Madras (85th), IIT Kharagpur (90th) and IIT Kanpur (97th). No Indian institution is in Asia's top 50 for the second year running.
Why did the IITs fall in QS Asia 2027?
QS says it is mostly competition: 195 new universities entered and many gained. Academic reputation fell for 76 per cent of Indian universities and employer reputation for 83 per cent. QS says two-thirds of the Indian universities that dropped still improved their overall scores.
Which IITs went up in QS Asia 2027?
IIT Hyderabad rose 19 places to 251st, IIT (BHU) Varanasi rose 18 places to 219th, and IIT (ISM) Dhanbad climbed 51 places to 373rd.
Is there a third attempt for JEE Advanced 2027?
Not as of 8 November 2026. A student petition with about 13,349 signatures asks for three attempts or two within three years, but the Joint Admission Board has announced no change. The current rule is two attempts in consecutive years.
When will the JEE Advanced 2027 exam date be announced?
It has not been announced yet. The dates for 2024, 2025 and 2026 were announced between 24 November and 5 December, so the 2027 date is likely in that window.
What is the last date to correct GATE 2027 application defects?
30 November 2026. IIT Madras extended the window to fix scrutiny defects without a fee from 3 November. The exam is on 6, 7, 13, 14, 20 and 21 February 2027.
Who won the Lam Research Challenge 2026?
An IIT Guwahati team of Suhani Maheswari, Aakash Kumar Meena, Shrut Jain and Kummari Premaja. IIT Ropar was runner-up and NIT Calicut third, out of 803 teams from 189 colleges. The top teams shared ₹10 lakh.
Your IIT had a week? Campus hoodies for every IIT: Delhi, Guwahati, Madras, Hyderabad, Ropar, Bombay, and the rest of the 23.
Support: Tele MANAS, the national mental health helpline, is free and available 24/7 on 14416.
By Arun Raghav S · Co-founder, IITian Vibes · Facts retrieved 8 November 2026 from the linked official pages and documents. Corrections to hello@iitianvibes.com.