Punjab Student Builds Portal to Track Student Internships

Nikhil Kumar, a 21-year-old B.Tech CSE student from Punjab, has developed "Place Intern," a portal designed to track student training. His motivation stemmed from personal experience after completing his diploma in 2025, when he encountered internships that either required a bachelor's degree or demanded fees for experience, highlighting barriers for diploma students.

Working with his faculty mentor, Sukeeratpal Singh, at Government Polytechnic College, Talwara, Nikhil was already developing a college management system. Vibha’s Programme Management Unit (PMU) identified an opportunity to adapt this system for a semester-long internship program, where students spend their final semester in industry instead of attending theory classes. This collaboration helped transform the initial project into a tool for monitoring practical training.

Place Intern now serves as a central platform that consolidates student internship records, faculty visits, and progress reports, thereby reducing reliance on disparate spreadsheets and paper-based submissions. Nikhil built and maintained the core system, while Singh provided insights into college workflows, and the Vibha PMU contributed program requirements and design refinements through testing and feedback. This ensures the portal supports all aspects of internship management.

The portal is structured for four user types: faculty record monthly visits, students submit progress reports, principals monitor tasks, and the Directorate in Chandigarh tracks overall progress via a dashboard. This initiative, supported by Vibha and its work with Punjab’s technical education department, aims to bridge the gap between classroom learning and employment, providing real-world experience for students like Nikhil.

Why it matters: This innovation streamlines internship management, making practical training more accessible and accountable for students.

Editor's note: A comprehensive summary that captures the project's origin, the collaboration with Vibha, and the portal's functionality as described in the source.