India, Aug. 17 -- There may be no better symbol of independent India's ambition than IIT Kharagpur. It rose from the grounds of the Hijli Detention Camp, where British forces imprisoned freedom fighters and, in 1931, shot dead two unarmed detainees. Less than two decades later, India transformed that site of repression into its first Indian Institute of Technology, turning ground once used to suppress Indian minds into a place that would produce engineers and scientists who helped shape the modern world.

As IIT Kharagpur celebrates its platinum jubilee, that history carries a larger lesson: India does its best work when it has the confidence to trust its own talent rather than wait for the West to define excellence.

The IIT system becam...