In a place where numbers, equations, and code take centre stage, the humanities can feel like an afterthought. But technology doesn't exist in isolation; it shapes the world we live in, influences policies, and impacts lives in ways that go beyond just technical skills. Humanities courses should be a space for students to explore these broader relations outside their engineering mindset. Yet, at IIT Delhi, this opportunity often goes untapped, not because students don't care, but because the system around them that pushes for efficiency over curiosity, and at times, even makes genuine interest challenging to pursue.
As soon as the pre-registration email lands in inboxes, students rush to seniors, searching for the 'most optimal' HUL based on everything except course content. Here, the focus is mainly on grading policies (8 on Average is a must), attendance requirements (preferably none), and effort needed (a course that can be aced with a single night of study).
A widely shared Excel sheet circulates among students, filled with reviews from seniors who previously took these courses. The discussion revolves around lenient professors, relaxed attendance rules, and effortless grading, leaving one question unanswered: What is the course about?
This mindset stems from two primary reasons:
1. The Hunger for Grades
The grading policy in core courses is already strict, with some averaging as low as 5 or 6. In such an environment, students desperately seek courses that can act as “grade boosters.” Since a high CGPA is often perceived as essential for survival, whether for placements, internships, or higher studies, students turn to OCs (Open Category Courses) like RDLs (Rural Development Lecture Courses), ASLs (Atmospheric Science Lecture Courses), which are famous for lenient grading, or the easiest possible HULs. The obsession with maintaining a competitive CGPA overshadows any academic curiosity, pushing students to prioritise grades over genuine learning.
2. Cultural Heirlooms
Much like many other aspects of IIT culture, freshers rely on their seniors when selecting their first HUL course. And what do seniors advise? The same mantra they followed: prioritise grading ease over subject matter. Freshers quickly internalise the belief that HULs exist only to balance out their struggling CGPA, not to explore subjects outside their technical domain. Once these freshers become seniors, they create a never-ending cycle by passing on the same advice. The idea that HULs could be a gateway to intellectual exploration or a break from rigid technical coursework gets lost in this inherited mindset.
3. A Vicious Cycle
With minimal interest shown by most students, professors are bound to feel demotivated. Upon realising this, they “ease the course”, trying to make it more palatable for the crowd, but in doing so they end up delivering suboptimal teaching and an overall bad outcome for students, especially the ones going to lectures wanting to learn deeply about the subject matter. This regression of HUL courses into a more wishy-washy version of them further discourages students from taking any real interest in them and solidifies their role as easy, CGPA-boosting courses.
After years of inherited advice and a culture that prioritises easy grades over genuine exploration, only a handful of students develop a real interest in HUL courses. But just when these students break free from the cycle and attempt to engage with the humanities, they sometimes face an entirely new roadblock: the administration itself. Despite their enthusiasm, they find themselves facing procedural hurdles that can make course registration a frustrating experience.
When a Willing Student Cannot Learn
Let me narrate a personal experience to highlight the plight of HUL courses at IITD.
If a student wants to learn something and a teacher wants to teach them exactly that, should they not be allowed to do so? This seemingly absurd question became a frustrating reality during the Add-Drop Window in January this year when I attempted to register for an HUL course. Spoiler alert: I failed.
For context, I had opted for the HUL course during pre-registration. However,
nearly the entire 2023 batch of MT1 had taken MTL106 instead of MTL104 in the third semester. This meant that MTL104 was "pending", and since it was being offered in the 4th semester, it was automatically added to my list of requested courses, but this resulted in the credit limit being exceeded, and to rectify that, the HUL course was automatically dropped for everyone in our branch.
By the time Add-Drop opened, there were no vacancies in the HUL course, I had chosen. Still, I remained hopeful as the professor had assured me, along with four others, that she would request the administration to allow us into the course. Despite repeated emails from the professor, personal requests, and multiple visits to the Academic Section, we were denied registration. Even after meeting the concerned Dean, our plea was barely heard before being rejected. We understand that the administration has its own concerns in maintaining a delicate course plan, but it is difficult to comprehend how, despite the keen interest of students and multiple requests from the professor, we were not allowed to register. For us, this was not just another course but something we were deeply interested in.
The Administrative Red Tape
The products and services we engineer do not exist in a vacuum and have profound social and humanitarian effects that we will be blinded to if we are not knowledgeable about these subjects.
A very famous example is Albert Einstein, who once said, “It was the one great mistake in my life.” referring to his letter to the then US President Franklin D Roosevelt, highlighting the potential of uranium as a source of energy, and for the construction of extremely powerful bombs. This is the letter that resulted in the Manhattan Project and ultimately, one of history’s most destructive inventions: the atomic bomb. Dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, two such bombs are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths.
While discussing the marvels of atomic energy, Albert Einstein and other scientists involved may not have sufficiently considered the political and social consequences of such an invention. Similarly, not being knowledgeable in social sciences and humanities can have far-reaching and catastrophic consequences when it comes to anything we engineer.
IIT Delhi rightly recognises this importance of humanities and social sciences in shaping well-rounded engineers. However, this recognition remains theoretical.
HUL courses come with administrative hurdles that technical courses do not. Once chosen, they cannot be dropped, rendering the Add-Drop Window useless if the course capacity is full. Unlike technical courses, where capacity can be increased upon request, HUL courses are rigidly capped, even if the professor themselves requests additional slots.Despite every justification given by the administration, it is a systemic failure when a student in one of the best institutions in the country is unable to sign up for a course in which they are deeply interested and despite having complete approval from the professor taking it.
It's easy to question the place of humanities courses in a technical institute like IIT. For many students, the path to IIT has been so rigidly structured, divided early into engineering or medicine, reinforced by years of coaching, that they've never really had the chance to explore subjects beyond their core syllabus. And even when they do, the pressure to chase grades often overshadows genuine curiosity.
IIT Delhi has incredible humanities professors and experts: faculty members regularly publish in leading national and international academic journals. The average number of publications per year, for the past five years, of the entire department is 68 (source - https://hss.iitd.ac.in/research). Given that the faculty conducts research in addition to teaching and administrative/service duties, this shows a high degree of commitment to research and publication.
Such a motivated and competent group of professors who have studied in universities such as Oxford, Cornell, Yale, and Princeton could help students see the world through a different lens and make them better engineers and human beings. However, between cultural conditioning and administrative roadblocks, many never truly get to engage with these courses. Maybe the real challenge isn't just picking an HUL—it's unlearning the idea that the humanities don't really belong in a technical education. Note: The views expressed in this opinion article solely belong to the author and do not constitute the views of BSP.
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