IIT Madras will mentor two new IITs at — Palakkad and Tirupati — which are commencing admissions for the academic year 2015-2016.

The IITs will offer BTech in Civil, Electrical, Computer Science and Mechanical with 30 seats in each branch. Director of IIT Madras Bhaskar Ramamurthi will be the Mentor Director of these IITs till the Ministry of Human Resource Management appoints a Head.

Addressing media persons on Wednesday, Ramamurthi said that senior faculty members including retired professors from IIT Madras, have been identified to teach at both the IITs.

Addressing the concerns of parents and students who are apprehensive about joining the new IITs, Ramamurthi said, “It is an opportunity for the students, since they would experience personalised education due to smaller batch sizes and extra attention being paid by the highly experienced faculty and staff.”

Campuses would be constructed on 500 acres with academic buildings, hostels and residential premises for faculty and staff. The Tirupati campus is being set up at Merlapaka village in Yerpedu mandal and the Palakkad campus at Pudussery West.

Till then they will operate from temporary premises set up in Tirupati at the Chadalawada group of Institutions and at AHALIA Integrated Campus in Kozhippara (for the Palakkad IIT).

From June 25, students can pick IIT Palakkad and IIT Tirupati as options while making their choices online. Classes for will begin on August 3 at IIT Palakkad and August 5 at Tirupati.

Our Hyderabad bureau reports that senior faculty members PB Sunil Kumar and KN Satyanarayana have been appointed as Professor-in-charge for IIT Palakkad and IIT Tirupati respectively.

The Union Cabinet on Wednesday has also approved setting up of Indian Institute of Management (IIM) in Visakhapatnam. The institution will commence classes with an intake of 140 students from the present academic year and the modalities will be announced soon.