IIT Madras is offering a free online course in artificial intelligence through the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL). This course is open to both undergraduate and postgraduate computer science students. While the course itself is free, certificates will be awarded based on student performance in an Rs 1,000 exam. The course can be completed within eight weeks.
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Professor Deepak Khemani, a professor at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at IIT Madras, will be the course instructor. He earned his BTech in Mechanical Engineering in 1980, his MTech in 1983, and his PhD in Computer Science from IIT Bombay in 1989. He has been with IIT Madras ever since. Professor Khemani’s long-term goals are to build articulate problem-solving systems using artificial intelligence that can interact with human beings.
What the IIT Madras Free Online Course on Artificial Intelligence Will Cover
To take this course, prior exposure to discrete mathematics is required, while familiarity with AI search methods for problem solving and AI knowledge representation and reasoning is helpful but not mandatory. Some of the topics that will be covered as part of the course are as follows:
- Constraint satisfaction problems (CSP), examples.
- Constraint networks, equivalent and projection networks.
- Constraint propagation, arc consistency, path consistency, i-consistency.
- Directional consistency and graph ordering, backtrack-free search, adaptive consistency.
- Search methods for solving CSPs: lookahead methods, dynamic variable and value ordering.
- Look back methods: Gaschnig’s back jumping, graph-based back jumping, conflict-directed back jumping. Combing lookahead with look back: learning.
- Model-based systems: model-based diagnosis, truth maintenance systems, planning as CSP.
Important Details of the Course
Those who wish to enrol for the course may log in and register with the Ministry of Education platform by using their Gmail address before 26 January 2026. The course will begin on 19 January 2026 and end on 13 March 2026. Those who wish to register for the exam to obtain certificates may do so before 13 February 2026. Those who pass the examinations will be given e-certificates with logos of IIT Madras and NPTEL. However, hard copies will not be dispatched. Those who wish to take the course are advised to visit the official website for further details
