At Heritage Centre, step back in time to relive your favourite IIT-M memories, while also grabbing a quick selfie by the booth where a digitised photo of your younger self appears. As we embark on this journey of nostalgia, Prof. R Nagarajan, faculty in charge of Heritage Centre, walks us through its evolution, and the importance of preserving history
Srivatsan S
“I don’t think any other academic institution in India has anything comparable to the Heritage Centre,” says Prof. R Nagarajan. Quite a tall claim, you wonder. Unless, of course, he is right. Inaugurated in 2006, the Heritage Centre was a pet project that was conceived by Prof. R Natarajan, former Director of the Institute, and was supported by the succeeding Director, Prof. M.S.Ananth. After several iterations, Prof. Ajit Kumar Kolar took a personal interest in setting up the Centre and “championed it”, as Nagarajan puts it.
Initially, a much larger space was chalked out. However, the Centre was eventually inducted into the administration building, on the ground floor. And it oddly paid off. For, as and when visitors — both from within and outside the country — dropped by, the Heritage Centre became the starting point and a necessary pitstop. 
“The smaller dimension of space gave people the feeling of intimacy. For a space like this, you need a good group of people doing actual work. We have Kumaran Sathasivam and Mamata Dash, and a couple of youngsters to drive the work,” adds Nagarajan.
Step into the Heritage Centre — or take a virtual tour, if you may — and the imposing six-feet portrait of Prof. B Sengupto is hard to miss. To celebrate the three creators — R Natarajan, MS Ananth and Ajit Kumar Kola — their portraits were unveiled by the former Director Prof. Bhaskar Ramamurthi during the inauguration of the Official Historical Archive on the occasion of diamond jubilee year in 2019.
The catch? The Centre was running the danger of hitting a stagnation point. They had to keep renewing it to make sure that the place is attractive enough for a revisit. After collecting feedback from visitors, faculty members, retired staff and alumni, what the advisory committee felt was that, while the Centre was providing a great facility, it lacked the wow factor that makes you want to come back. Thus began a long journey of digitisation that started just before the pandemic in 2019. “The funding was provided through a grant from our Institute of Eminence. It was a very generous allocation of funds by Director (then) Bhaskar Ramamurthi,” he says. The revamped Heritage Centre, with a new facade and a character, was formally inaugurated by Nirmala Sitharaman, Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister in 2022.
Immersive experience
In order to grab the attention of visitors, making sure the exhibits were interactive, they came up with the concept of a dome right at the centre, which almost functions like a nucleus telling an immersive story of IIT-M’s achievements, campus life and biodiversity. The audience walks around the dome, going through IIT-M’s history and its historical relevance — right from the German phase, when technical and financial aid from Germany helped in establishing IIT-M, to a rich tapestry of photographs and artefacts; academic and research side, as well as student and campus life. The circle completes with the achievements of alumni and the “birds and bees” of the campus.
The Heritage Centre does an exhibit every couple of months, apart from organising walks. A tastefully-curated exhibit on the days of yore was recently displayed as part of the 17th Heritage Centre Day in March, and the 64th Institute Day in April. The next exhibit, informs Nagarajan, will have a combined theme of ‘convocation over the years’ as well as ‘hostel days and hostel nights’. The most popular exhibit, however, has been the digitised ID card library where students can pull up their old photos.
Visitors are screened a series of heritage-related movies at the newly-installed mini-theatre that can house over 25 people. Funded by an alumnus of the 1981 batch, the theatre aims to capture the look and feel of the institute’s own Open Air Theatre (OAT), and has a Dolby Atmos sound system.
Given the attention and interest Heritage Centre has been getting from international delegations who take on the heritage tour when they visit the campus, the continued evolution of the Centre is but natural. “Adding an AR (augmented reality) to the exhibits, for example, would be great. So people can walk around and point at things and get animated stories or audio video recordings pop up. This is probably one of the next steps we will take. We want to have at least 20 to 25 such AR elements,” he adds.
Ever since its renovation and reopening in 2022, the Heritage Centre has formed a club that not only includes IIT-M alumni as members but also people who are interested in heritage and history. Recently, a gift shop was integrated into the Centre offering a variety of collectables — from institute memorabilia to merchandise.
As for the future, plans are already on to have an exclusive VR Centre where people can walk in and experience for themselves certain parts of IIT Madras that may not be accessible for them otherwise — the scenic lake, for instance. Employing a drone to chart out the lake and its course from end to end may come handy in serving an experiential VR experiment.
The Heritage Centre is a self-sufficient model whose laid-back approach has so far worked out in its favour. Given the highly competitive environment that IIT-M has landed itself not just nationally but globally, the time has come for the Centre to take the gloves off. “We have come to realise that it is not really enough to be good, but you have to let it be known that you are good,” says Nagarajan.
“All said and done, we are celebrating our own history because we are proud of the way this institution has grown. We want to share the joy with people; how far we have come and where we are headed.”
“Another thing we want to address concerns students. It has always bothered alumni that despite the NIRF rankings for five consecutive years, if you look at the JEE (advanced) and look at the top 100 students, they don’t come to IIT-M. They either go to IIT Delhi or Bombay; only a handful come to IIT-M. And I think places such as the Heritage Centre can hopefully change the minds of some of these students, more importantly, their parents. So, we want to encourage even high school students and their parents to come visit Heritage Centre to see how IIT-M has grown over the years to become the top institution in India.”
“A lot of the visiting international delegates appreciate the fact that we started IIT-M with the assistance of German universities and professors, and we have continued to maintain strong relations with Germany. We also have joint centres like the Indo-German Centre for Sustainability. It is no longer a one-way relationship where they provide all the brains and money, and we provide students. We are more equal partners. This does indicate our visitors from abroad that IIT-M is welcoming of foreign collaborations. Because it’s in our blood; in our DNA.”
