Asheesh Kumar
Dr Ashish Kumar’s life reads like a map of places that taught him to adapt. Born in Banda district of Uttar Pradesh, he moved often because his father was in the army – living in Hyderabad, Jammu and Kashmir, Bareilly, and finally Allahabad (Prayagraj). Those early shifts bred a practical curiosity that later found its home in engineering and research. He completed his B.Tech. in 2007, followed by an M.Tech. in Applied Mechanics and Mineral Science from NIT in 2009. In 2011, he joined the Materials Science programme at IIT Kanpur and defended his PhD on 14 July 2017.
His professional life weaves teaching, research, and innovation into a single, purposeful thread. After his early teaching posts, he pursued doctoral research at IIT Kanpur and later returned to Hyderabad to build a sustained academic career. Now an Assistant Professor at Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Technology, Telangana, he teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students while guiding postgraduate research. Over nearly a decade, he has co-authored books, contributed chapters to edited volumes, published widely in national and international journals, and organised several faculty development programmes, workshops, and conferences.
With three international patents granted and more than three Indian patent applications filed, his work reflects a continuous cycle in which classroom questions evolve into research ideas, and research, in turn, enriches his teaching – making his academic journey both coherent and impactful.
A quieter revolution came in 2018 when he began engaging seriously with NPTEL. Over successive semesters, he enrolled in roughly forty-seven courses and earned certificates in about forty-three. The recognitions soon followed – Elite and Elite + Silver, Elite + Gold, Successfully Completed, and a constellation of NPTEL Stars that spoke to both depth and consistency: Believer, Enthusiast, Motivated Learner, Evangelist, Superstar, Discipline Star, and Domain Scholar. Yet, for him, these badges are only signposts of something deeper. NPTEL became a virtual classroom that filled the gaps that live lectures could not – offering transcripts to revisit, PDFs to study, weekly assignments and problem-solving sessions to practise, and the freedom to pause and replay complex concepts until they became clear.
He engages with NPTEL in three interconnected ways – as a learner who revisits lectures to deepen his understanding, as a teacher who draws upon its structured content and examples to enrich his classroom and laboratory sessions, and as an academic who references it while framing syllabi and preparing for accreditation. He particularly values the platform’s punctuality – the regular release of materials and timely notifications through email and the SWAYAM portal make planning easier. As he aptly observes, for an autonomous institute, such reliability is indispensable when designing practicals and aligning the curriculum.
He advises students to treat NPTEL as their virtual classroom. In his words, “Don’t chase certificates alone; chase understanding. Register for the equivalent NPTEL course when you enroll for a semester subject and use the lecture as daily homework- watch, rewatch, do the assignments, then return to the classroom with better questions. Aim for domain certifications if you want depth that will help in placements and research.” That loop – classroom learning, NPTEL review, assignments, and sharper classroom dialogue – is the habit he urges every student to build.
Beyond teaching, he continues to see learning as a lifelong pursuit. His passion for NPTEL naturally extends to mentoring others, urging students and colleagues alike to use the platform not merely for certificates but for clarity and understanding. For him, teaching and learning are inseparable – every lecture he prepares, every course he undertakes, and every discussion he leads feeds into the same cycle of curiosity and growth.
His story is not one of sudden transformation but of steady accumulation: places that taught him agility, institutions that refined his skills, and platforms like NPTEL that deepened his understanding.
To those who follow, he offers a simple counsel – make NPTEL your companion to classroom learning; rewatch, solve, apply, and let disciplined study turn good lectures into lasting learning.
~written by Satyam Shukla