IIT Kharagpur to pioneer India's First Dedicated School of Physical AI

Kolkata, October 26, 2026

In a pioneering initiative aimed at defining the next frontier of artificial intelligence in India, the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT Kharagpur) has entered into a landmark tripartite Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with distinguished alumnus and philanthropist Shri Vinod Gupta and IITKGP Foundation USA to establish the Benjamin Gupta School of Physical AI.
Envisioned as India's first dedicated academic school focused on Physical AI, the initiative represents a strategic shift from artificial intelligence predominantly centred on data, algorithms and digital applications towards AI that understands, interacts with, predicts and intelligently controls the physical world.
The School will seek to position IIT Kharagpur at the forefront of an emerging global technological paradigm in which artificial intelligence is deeply integrated with the governing principles of physics, engineering, biological systems and domain-specific scientific knowledge.
The ₹35 crore initiative will be supported by a ₹12.5 crore contribution from the Vinod Gupta family, ₹10 crore from an alumnus who wishes to remain anonymous, and the balance from IIT Kharagpur. The investment will support dedicated infrastructure housing the Department of Artificial Intelligence and associated interdisciplinary academic and research activities.
The School will be named in cherished memory of Shri Gupta's late son, Benjamin Gupta, transforming a deeply personal legacy into an enduring institution for scientific advancement and societal impact.
While conventional AI has made remarkable advances in language, vision and data-driven prediction, the next transformative frontier lies in enabling intelligent systems to operate reliably in the real world, where physical laws, uncertainty, material behaviour, biological complexity, safety and engineering constraints cannot be ignored. Physical AI seeks to bridge this divide by integrating artificial intelligence with fundamental physical principles, mechanistic understanding, real-world sensing, experimentation and intelligent control.
IIT Kharagpur intends to champion this frontier through a distinctive approach that combines physics-informed machine learning, scientific AI, digital twins, intelligent robotics, autonomous systems, advanced sensing, computational engineering and AI-enabled experimentation. The School will pursue interdisciplinary research and translation across advanced manufacturing, energy systems, climate and environmental technologies, agriculture, healthcare, medical devices, intelligent infrastructure and next-generation engineering systems.
Its defining philosophy will be that AI must not merely learn from data; it must also learn from, respect and intelligently interact with the laws governing the physical world.
Drawing on IIT Kharagpur's breadth of expertise across engineering, basic sciences, medicine, computation and emerging technologies, the School will bring together domain scientists, engineers, AI researchers, industry practitioners and clinicians to develop reliable, explainable and deployable solutions. The initiative will also emphasize safe, trustworthy and responsible AI, especially in safety-critical applications where physical consistency, robustness and accountability are indispensable.
A major distinguishing feature of the Benjamin Gupta School of Physical AI will be its focus on reimagining advanced education and professional upskilling for an AI-integrated technological future.
Academic programmes are expected to commence from the upcoming academic session, with proposed offerings including hybrid-mode Master's programmes, executive education, professional certification and specialized interdisciplinary learning modules, subject to the requisite academic approvals. These programmes will be designed to serve students, researchers, working professionals, industry technologists and graduates from engineering, physical sciences, life sciences and medicine. Beyond conventional degree education, the School is envisaged as a finishing school for the modern generation of engineers, scientists and medical professionals, offering value-added, application-oriented learning that enables them to combine their foundational disciplinary knowledge with contemporary AI capabilities.
The underlying educational philosophy is centred around the fact that the future engineer should not merely use an AI tool to solve an engineering problem; the engineer must understand how physical laws, material properties, system dynamics and computational intelligence can be brought together to formulate and solve that problem. Similarly, the future medical professional must be equipped to combine clinical and biological understanding with AI-enabled diagnostics and decision support, rather than rely uncritically on opaque algorithmic outputs.
Through flexible hybrid learning, interdisciplinary projects, industry-linked problem-solving, laboratory exposure and domain-specific AI applications, the School aims to create a new generation of professionals capable of developing and deploying AI with scientific understanding, technological confidence and real-world accountability.
This approach is expected to help bridge a critical national skills gap between rapidly expanding AI capabilities and the specialized domain knowledge required to translate them into dependable physical technologies.
Disclosing his gratitude towards Shri Vinod Gupta and his family for aiding in bringing in India's first dedicated academic school focused on Physical AI, Prof. Suman Chakraborty, Director, IIT Kharagpur, said, "Artificial intelligence has transformed the way we process information. Its next great leap will be in transforming the way we understand, engineer and interact with the physical world. IIT Kharagpur aspires to lead this transition in India through the Benjamin Gupta School of Physical AI." He added, "Our vision is to move beyond treating AI as a black-box solution. An engineer must understand the physics behind an intelligent machine; a scientist must connect AI predictions with fundamental scientific principles; and a medical professional must combine algorithmic intelligence with biological and clinical understanding. The future belongs not simply to those who can use AI, but to those who can integrate AI with deep domain knowledge to create technologies that are reliable, explainable and impactful."
The Benjamin Gupta School of Physical AI will seek to catalyse a collaborative ecosystem connecting academia, industry, healthcare institutions, research laboratories, startups and international partners. By integrating fundamental scientific discovery, advanced education, translational research, technology development and professional reskilling, the School aims to accelerate India's capabilities in indigenous, reliable and globally competitive AI-enabled physical technologies.
 

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