2 Unconventional Professors

Way to go, Prof. Kulkarni!
My formal teaching stint was in IIT Madras from 1962 to 69. Chemical Process Principles, Chemistry of Engineering Materials, Process Control Instrumentation, and others were my subjects.
The basic syllabus and some text books were prescribed.
I would stay within the broad confines of the syllabus. However, all my tests were totally away from the text books.
One assignment I gave was for a fairly straight forward oxidation process. The catch was that I said that the place was a planet methane atmosphere with various oxide minerals. The students had to devise a way of generating oxygen design a furnace to work in a methane atmosphere, and produce the product. I graded not for a right answer but for approach.
In 1965, India was at war with Pak. There was shortage of drinking water in Rann of Kutch. I asked the students to come up with ideas. The top marks went to one team that came up with desalination of brackiish water by using the military vehicle engine cooling system.
Likewise for temperature control, I supplied tinned iron foil and copper foil. The student had to solder strips of these together to produce a bimetallic element and use it to get a temperature control function.
The German Professor (IIT Madras was German aided) was so impressed with some the output that he exported the experiment back his German University adding all differential equations and such.
None of this was appreciated of course.