Way back in 1946, an idea grew in visionary leaders of the country, of creating of Higher Technical Institutes for post-war industrial development in India. A Committee, headed by Nalini Ranjan Sarkar, recommended the establishment of these institutes in various parts of India. The first Indian Institute of Technology was founded in May 1950 at Kharagpur. Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India, at the First Convocation of IIT Kharagpur in 1956, clarified in his Address that these institutes of technology will help meet the technological challenges of the Nation. During 1959-1960 four IITs were established at Bombay, Delhi, Kanpur and Madras. Subsequently, on 15 September 1956, the Parliament of India passed an act known as the Institutes of Technology (Kharagpur) Act, 1961 declaring IIT Kharagpur as an Institute of national importance. Also, IIT Kharagpur was given the status of an autonomous University. Thereupon, IIT Guwahati started in 1992, and also the then University of Roorkee was given the status of an IIT (and now called IIT Roorkee) in 2001.

Establishment of eight more IITs across the country began with a decision of the Cabinet, which was announced by the Minister of Human Resource Development on 28 March 2008. IIT Bhubaneswar, IIT Gandhinagar, IIT Hyderabad, IIT Jodhpur (earlier called IIT Rajasthan), IIT Patna and IIT Ropar began functioning from 2008, and two others, IIT at Indore and IIT Mandi commenced their sessions from 2009. During the past decades since 1956, IITs became hallmark of quality technology undergraduate education internationally, attributed largely to ambience for quality academics. The endeavor at IIT Jodhpur is to live up to this brand image, which has been built meticulously over the last 60 years, with a renewed focus of producing world-class technology-driven graduates to contribute towards the development of the nation.