Everything You Should Know About IIT Guwahati’s MA in Development Studies

The Indian Institute of Technology(IIT), Guwahati is a premier public technical and research university, located in Guwahati, Assam. It was the sixth IIT established in India in 1994, and since then, the university has rapidly evolved to become one of the best educational institutions in the country. Recognized as an institute of national importance by the government of India, the institute has been ranked as the 8th best institute in India by NIRF rankings, 2021. The institute emphasises research and has excellent faculty. It is spread across a 285-acre campus on the banks of the Brahmaputra river. At present the Institute has eleven departments and five inter-disciplinary academic centers covering all major engineering, science and humanities disciplines, offering B.Tech, B.Des, MA, M.Des, M.Tech, M.Sc and Ph.D programmes. 

The department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the IIT Guwahati promotes interdisciplinary work in humanities and social sciences with wide-ranging research and expertise in Economics, English, Linguistics, Philosophy, Psychology, Sociology, History, Archaeology, Political Science, Geography and Development Studies. Apart from offering projects, supervision and fellowship, the department provides highly inter-disciplinary areas of expertise and investigation as part of its MA programme. The MA programme in Development Studies was initiated in 2009, to provide academic training in issues related to the development and its various perspectives. With a focus on guided research and rigorous course work, the master’s programme helps its students to approach the complex issue of development through perspectives drawn from different disciplines in Humanities and Social Sciences.  

The course is a two-year full-time course, divided into four semesters. The students are expected to grapple with complex socio-political issues and develop a critical understanding of the Indian context, as well as write an original dissertation in their second year. The programme provides flexibility to the students in the second year with multiple electives ranging from Conflict and Financial Diplomacy to Region, Nation and the Making of Post-Colonial India. The programme offers a maximum of 48 seats. Prospective candidates have to sit for a written examination conducted yearly by the institute. A part of the test consists of multiple-choice questions and the other part is descriptive. The areas covered are current affairs, contemporary economy, politics, society, as well as logical reasoning. Currently, the only center for taking the test is IIT Guwahati. The candidates must have secured a minimum of 50% marks in their undergraduate degree programme to be eligible for the entrance test.  

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