THE HISTORY PAGE




Presented below is a brief history of the department of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering:

The seeds of the department were sown in the Electrical Engineering Department of Jadavpur University when Professor Jnan Saran Chatterjee, the founder of this department was recruited by the then Vice-Chancellor Prof. Triguna Sen. Prof. Chatterjee joined the Electrical Engineering Department (Communication Specialization) in 1955. At that time Prof. H.C. Guha introduced the 'Communication' specialization at the Electrical Engineering Dept. J.U. in 1951 out of which the Telecommunication area sprang off. Prof. Sen's idea that Prof. Chatterjee would plan to set up a separate department of Telecommunication Engineering. Prof. Chatterjee came from the Institute of Radiophysics and Electronics, Calcutta University. A year later in 1956, his student, Prof. A.R.Saha joined the Electrical Engineering Department (Communication Specialisation). Prof. Chatterjee and Prof. Saha worked together in the planning and setting up of this department. Finally, the new department called Telecommunication Engineering Department was born under the leadership of Prof. J.S. Chatterjee in the year 1957 and it was housed in a separate building within the campus. During the next few years, Profs. P. Kundu, S. Deb, S. Bannerjee, U.S. Ganguly, B. Nag and P.C. Sen joined this new department. From 1957 the regular B.E. Tel. E. program started in this department. Subsequently frem 1961 the M.E. Tel. E. program had also been introduced. In the next few years the subject developed so rapidly that the department had to be renamed as Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering department In the year 1965. Gradually the department grew and new courses were started. In 1966, a 3-year B.Tech course in Instrumentation and Electronics Engineering was started. Later in 1968 a one year P.G. diploma course in Computer Science was introduced. Finally a 4-year degree course in Computer Science and Engineering was initiated in the year 1981. From 1985, a regular 3-Sem MCSE Course started. All these courses were running concurrently under the aegis of the department of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering, JU. The department became so big that at one point of time by the year 1986 the staff strength was around fifty and the total number of students were about 400. in 1988 the department was trifurcated into three departments, viz the department of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering, the department of Computer Science and Engineering and the department of Instrumentation Engineering. All the three departments are still growing. During this long journey, we have lost our beloved teachers Prof. Chatterjee, Prof. Deb and Prof. Nag - we remember them with due respect as they are the founders of the department. We also lost our dear colleagues Mr. D.K. Ghose and Prof. A.K. Mukherjee. Some data on the present status of the ETCE department: