Rahul & Namita Gautam Chair
Mr. Rahul Gautam (BT/CHE/1975) is the Director of Sheela Foam and Chairman of Joyce Pvt. Ltd. In 1971, he, along with his mother, founded one of India's largest foam manufacturing companies, Sheela Foam, branded as Sleepwell mattresses. Under Mr. Gautam's leadership, the company expanded its wings offshore as well, setting up manufacturing units in Australia. He has more than 45 years of experience in the manufacturing of home products and in the PU foam industry.
The Sleepwell Foundation, established by Mr. Gautam, supports various Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives in education and sports. IIT Kanpur conferred upon him the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2017.
Mr. Gautam, along with his wife, Mrs. Namita Gautam, instituted the Rahul & Namita Gautam Chair.
Current Occupant
Dr. Tanmoy Maiti
(Oct. 2024 - Sep. 2027)
Prof. Tanmoy Maiti from the department of Material Science and Engineering, IIT Kanpur. His research spans clean energy technologies, including thermoelectrics, waste-heat harvesting, electroceramics, oxide electronics (pyroelectrics and ferroelectrics), semiconductor devices, and perovskite solar cells. He also works on next-generation chip-scale technologies such as RRAM and optical memory based on plasmonic lenses.
Prof. Maiti has received several prestigious awards and recognitions. He was awarded the P. K. Kelkar Young Faculty Research Fellowship (2019) at IIT Kanpur for outstanding research contributions. His work on oxide thermoelectrics was highlighted in the Journal of Materials Research under the "2019 Early Career Scholars in Materials Science" by the Materials Research Society. He was selected for the IEI Young Engineers Award (2014) in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering by The Institution of Engineers (India).
Earlier in his career, he received a prestigious postdoctoral fellowship at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (2008-2009). He was also honored with the Kennametal Graduate Student Fellowship (2007) and the Penn State Student Leadership Stipend (2005-2006) at Pennsylvania State University, USA, recognizing his academic excellence and leadership.
Former Occupant
Prof. Vinod Kumar Singh
(Nov. 2022 - Sep. 2024)
Prof. Vinod K. Singh, Department of Chemistry, research interest lies in Synthetic Organic Chemistry - Asymmetric Synthesis. He developed several new chiral ligands/catalysts for enantioselective reactions. One of the chiral catalysts developed in his laboratory, called "Singh's Catalyst", is an efficient chiral organocatalyst for enantioselective aldol reaction in aqueous medium. Prof. Singh served as a senior scientist in Nurogen Corporation, Connecticut before joining IITK as a faculty. He was the Director of IISER Bhopal (2008-2018). Prof. Singh is the recipient of many prestigious awards and honors - Padma Shri, Govt. of India (2014), Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar Prize (2004), Swarnajayanti Fellowship (1998). He earned his doctorate from M.S. University, Baroda in 1986.