Before we go to promotion, you should get a confirmation letter that you completed probationary period (which is for initial year).
When you complete 11 months of your probation report, the council section will send a letter to your department chairman for confirmation of your contract (which is for 5 years, indicated in your offer letter). To get this confirmation, you need to submit a report (format: DOC | PDF) of the work done by you during this probationary period. Once the report is received, you will receive a letter from the council section (unit- IA) that the director has confirmed your contract (which is for 5 years).
A report similar to promotion needs to be submitted at the end of 3 years (or 3.5 years depending on the Division you are in) for active feedback on the performance of the faculty member (Assistant professor). This report requires the faculty member to give brief description of his/her research, projects for which he/she have obtained funding, the number of Ph.D. and Master's students who are working under his/her guidance, the courses he/she has taught and other departmental activities with which he/she had helped. It also includes list of publications and conferences at which he/she presented research results. Moreover, a summary of difficulties in research and/or teaching could be added. This report is suppose to help the institute to offer constructive advise for strengthening the faculty member's research program. (format: latex | PDF)
A 5 year report is required for confirmation of services (that is to make the faculty member either permanent or continue for another contract period; similar to tenure system in the West), which needs to be forwarded through the department. This report needs to be submitted atleast 6 months prior to end of 5 year contract period. This report format is similar to 3 year format (latex | PDF). Institute also has the authority to renew the contract for a period not exceeding 5 years, in cases where the tenure is not given.
Promotion policies What are the guidelines on promotions? What counts i.e. papers, doctoral students, etc?
The key is papers and number of doctoral students graduated.
In IISc, the normal period of promotion is 6 years from assistant professor to associate professor and 6 years from associate professor to full professor. At the end of 5.5 years, the section will ask you to file your papers. See below for the format and details. You suggest 8 referees (4 Indian and 4 foreign) and the department will suggest 8 referees (4 Indian and 4 foreign) and this list is sent to the divisional chairman. [In IISc, we have six divisions and departments belong to a particular division. Each division has a divisional chairman.] He will pick up 8 names from this and send your details to these referees. Once the comments are received, these will be discussed by a promotion and assessment committee. This committee consists of all six divisional chairmen, the associate director, director and 8-12 very eminent scientists from India, who do not belong to IISc. The case will be considered by this committee and you will be promoted. The normal expectation is ten papers in engineering and 15-20 in sciences in six years. However, no number is written down because it depends more on quality than quantity and the comments of the referees.
Cases are also considered for early promotion (and termed as "out-of-turn"). These are not frequent and, as far as I know, only ten faculty have been promoted out of turn in the last ten years.
There is a grievance committee in place to address specific cases.
This is different from how 'promotions' happen at IITM (generally similar in other IITs also). IITM does not have 'promotion' but actually recruitment to higher posts. So, every 2-3 years or so, an advertisement is put out calling for applications for asso and/or full profs (and also asst profs). Every department has its own norms for shortlisting and the institute also has some overall norms - in the form of x publications, y MS / PhD graduates, z volume of sponsored projects and some norms for teaching activity (new courses introduced, new labs, new teaching methods, tools, aids etc and also feedback from students on effectiveness of teaching). The applications received in response to the advertisement (will include local 'promotion' candidates and also external applicants) are scrutinized by a department level committee for shortlisting. The report of this committee is sent to central administration which then arranges for interviews by a selection committee. The selection committee consists of the Director, subject experts nominated by the department (through senate) and the board of governors and also one of the members of the board of governors (often one of the faculty representative on the board). In the case of professors, there is also an expert nominated by the Visitor (the President of India) whereas for assistant and associate professors, the Head of the Department takes this slot. Candidates called for interview usually make a presentation in the department; the feedback from the department from this presentation, the report of the departmental shortlisting committee and the application package are all presented to the selection committee which then interviews the candidates. Now-a-days, candidates who are not able to be physically present are interviewed over the phone by the selection committee. It is entirely upto this selection committee to decide on appointment and initial salary. Obviously, the subject experts in the selection committee play a crucial role.
It is important to realize that promotions yield hardly any monetary benefits. Continuous increment of 3% of Basic+AGP will ensure that one will reach the end of the scale of 67,000 at the end of 23 years, if never promoted (see orange columns). If promoted to professor under the IISc scheme of 6 years as assistant professor followed by six years as associate professor (see green columns), one will reach the end of the scale at the end of 21 years. The only difference will be in the grade pay.