From the Director’s Desk am delighted to present the Annual Report of the Communications were planned. One may recall that on Indian Statistical Institute for the year 2018-19. This June 29, 2017, the then Hon’ble President of India, Shri I Institute that started its journey in December 1931 in Pranab Mukherjee, had inaugurated the 125th Birth Kolkata has today grown into a unique institution of higher Anniversary Celebrations of Mahalanobis. learning spread over several cities of India. The Institute, founded by the visionary PC Mahalanobis, continues It is always a delight to inform that once again the its glorious tradition of disseminating knowledge in Institute faculty members have been recognized both Statistics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Quantitative nationally and internationally with a large number of Economics and related subjects. The year 2018-19 saw honors and awards. I mention some of these here. In the formation of the new Council of the Institute. I am 2018, Arunava Sen was conferred the TWAS-Siwei Cheng delighted to welcome Shri Bibek Debroy as the President Prize in Economics and Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay of the Institute. It is also a privilege that Professor was conferred the TWAS Prize Engineering Sciences in Goverdhan Mehta continues to guide the Institute as the Trieste, Italy. Arup Bose was selected as J.C. Bose Fellow Chairman of the Council. for 2019-2023 after having completed one term of this fellowship from 2014 to 2018. Nikhil Ranjan Pal was The Institute conducted its 53rd Convocation in January appointed President, IEEE Computational Intelligence 2019. The Institute was happy to have Lord Meghnad Society. Sushmita Mitra became Fellow of the Indian Jagdishchandra Desai, Padma Bhushan, Emeritus National Science Academy and received the Flex Award Professor, London School of Economics, as the Chief given by the Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Guest. During the year, the Institute observed the closing Excellence Fellowship for 2019-2020. Pradipta Maji was ceremony of the 125th Birth Anniversary Celebrations of elected Fellow of the National Academy of Science. P.C. Mahalanobis in Kolkata and the different Centres. Parthanil Roy received the Swarna Jayanti Fellowship, The year-long celebrations were marked by a series of 2017-2018. He was appointed as the Bernoulli Society academic activities, culminating with the closing ceremony Youth Representative for 2017-2020. Amartya K. Dutta that was graced by the Hon’ble Vice-President of India, was awarded the Satish C. Bhatnagar Award for Best Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu and Shri D.V. Sadananda Gowda, Publication in the field of History of Mathematics. the then Hon’ble Minister of Statistics & Programme Malay Bhattacharyya was awarded INAE Young Engineer Implementation on June 29, 2018. A commemorative Award in Computer Science and also selected as INAE coin, a photo album and a music album were released by Young Associate for 2018. Abhik Ghosh has won IEEE- the Hon’ble Vice-President of India. Google launched a GRSS Regional Leader Award in 2019. A more detailed Google doodle to commemorate the day. Google Arts and list is provided in the report. A large number of faculty Culture paid tribute to the visionary leader by organizing members continue taking up editorial assignments in the an online exhibition of his life and works (https:// respective fields. The Institute faculty published more artsandculture.google.com/entity/prasanta-chandra- than 730 papers and received more than 5200 citations mahalanobis/m01_b18?categoryid=historical-figure). in 2018. The Institute is proud of their achievements and Special issues of journals Sankhya and Cryptography & wishes them further success in the future. An academic institution is incomplete without a vibrant Sydney, Universita Degli Studi Di Trieste, Italy, Technical set of visitors bringing with them fresh inputs and ideas. University of Košice, Slovakia, Basque Centre for Applied We were privileged to welcome a large number of eminent Mathematics (BCAM), Spain, University of the Aegean, visitors from around the world in various disciplines to Greece, London School of Economics and Political the Institute. These are mentioned in the Annual Report. Science (LSE), University of Campinas, Brazil, University During this period several conferences and workshops of Gothenburg, Sweden, University of Porto, Portugal, were organized by the various units of the Institute. Some Cancer Research Malaysia, Dauphine Université Paris, of these were the International Conference on Probability Geological Survey of India, Airports Authority of India, held in January 2018, the International Conference on National Highway Authority of India, Ministry of Mines, India Biodiversity Meet organized by the Agriculture & Tata Consultancy Services, Credit – Suisse, R S Software Ecological Research Unit during February 14-16, 2019, India Limited, Cognizant Technology Solutions India Pvt. 4th International Workshop on Pattern Analysis and Ltd., Price water house Coopers, TATA Steel and many Applications organized by the Computer Vision & Pattern more. Apart from these, the Institute is working very Recognition Unit, Kolkata during February 26-28, 2019 closely with the Government of India and various state and the International Conference on Future of Libraries governments for solving problems of social importance organized by the Library and Reprography & Photography and for improvement of services being offered by the Division, in collaboration with IIM, Bangalore, held government, in addition to conducting a large number of at Bangalore Centre during January 26-28, 2019. On training programs for government officials. December 18th, 2018, the Foundation Day of the Institute was celebrated with a lecture by Professor Parthasarathi Construction activities are going on in the different Chakraborti, Director, Indian Institute of Engineering campuses of the Institute. The academic and Science and Technology, Shibpur. administrative buildings of the campus of ISI North East in Tezpur and the campus of the RC Bose Centre for The regular academic degree programs of the Institute Cryptology and Security are nearing completion. New are going strong as usual. The post graduate diploma construction in Bangalore campus and repair works in in statistical methods and applications conducted in the Kolkata campus are ongoing. A Centre for Artificial the North-East Centre of the Institute in Tezpur was Intelligence and Machine Learning was set up in ISI opened up for students from across the country, with Kolkata to cater to the growing demand in this area. The half of the seats being reserved for those domiciled in Institute needs significant additional funding for further the North East. This course is also planned to be initiated expansion and improvement of the existing infrastructure in the Chennai Centre of the Instiute. The two-year in its multiple campuses. The Institute also needs the Post Graduate Diploma in Business Analytics course, support of the government to enhance the number of conducted jointly with the Indian Institute of Management faculty posts, especially in the new centers in Tezpur Calcutta and Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, and Chennai, to enable initiation of substantial academic although comparatively new continued to be rated very programs there. While the Institute needs to overcome high internationally. The Statistical Training Diploma several constraints to maintain the high standards it has offered by the International Statistical Education Centre, set for itself, it is blessed with full cooperation from the serving officials and students from different countries, administrative ministry. I am thankful to the Secretary, is running successfully with the current batch having Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation trainees from eleven countries. and all other officials of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India as The Institute receives grants-in-aid from the Ministry also the Additional Secretary and Financial Adviser of Statistics and Program Implementation, Government for their active support. Approaching the completion of India. The faculty members also conduct a large of the fourth year as Director, I want to express my number of research and training projects throughout deep gratitude to the President of the Institute and the the year. The major government agencies like DBT, Chairman of the Council for their able guidance and DST, MeITy, DAE, NITI Aayog, RBI, Government of West support. I thank all the experts who serve the Institute in Bengal, Government of Jharkhand fund several research different capacities. Finally, I thank all the scientific and projects. Memorandum of Understandings (MOUs) non-scientific workers, students and well-wishers of the have been signed/ extended between ISI and several Institute for extending their cooperation for the all-round other organizations including University of Technology, development of the Institute. March 31, 2019 Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay Preface This Annual Report gives you a glimpse into the research and teaching activities of the Indian Statistical Institute during April 2018 to March 2019 in a completely new and revised format. Apart from the general layout, the note worthy changes include addition of new content, which comprise activities that have always been an integral part of ISI, like placement for students, national & international activities etc. In addition to teaching, research activities