IIT Kanpur to start MBBS from 2029, 450-bed hospital on campus to open in April 2027

IIT Kanpur will no longer be confined to engineering. The institute, counted among the country's leading technical institutions, will also teach MBBS and PhD courses in future. Director Prof Manindra Agrawal spoke about upcoming plans and achievements at a press conference on the institute's 67th foundation day.

According to Prof Agrawal, a 450-bed super-speciality hospital on the IIT Kanpur campus will start functioning from April 2027. The institute is preparing to begin the admission process for MBBS and PhD courses from the 2029 session.

The hospital is being built on the campus under the "Gangwal School of Medical Sciences and Technology" and is almost ready. The director said work was delayed slightly this year because of heavy rain and a dispute between construction companies. It will be inaugurated in April 2027 and services for patients will begin. Once the hospital is running, patients from about 10 districts, including Kanpur, will not have to travel to large cities such as Delhi and Mumbai for treatment of serious illnesses.

On the courses, clinical courses will begin from 2029. Notably, from the 2027 session itself, IIT Kanpur will start non-clinical subjects related to the medical field, and M.Tech and PhD programmes in medical engineering.

Cyber security was also discussed at the press conference. The Uttar Pradesh government is building a modern data centre in Lucknow to keep the data of various departments secure. The responsibility for cyber security of this government data centre has been given to IIT Kanpur. Prof Agrawal said the institute has developed an advanced cyber security operation system capable of withstanding any kind of cyber attack. The Lucknow data centre will be protected with indigenous technology.

In addition, the government is setting up a "U Hub" to promote deep-tech start-ups in Uttar Pradesh. Under it, two centres have been prepared in the state. The first will be at IIT Kanpur's Noida campus and the second at IIIT Lucknow. Both centres are likely to be inaugurated at the end of this month. The main aim is to provide the necessary facilities to new start-ups working in the deep-tech sector.