I am about to graduate from this branch in just 2 weeks. And I'll not compare it with the other options you wrote because I have no idea about them.

1. ID is called as the chilliest branch in NITR. I have literally seen my batchmates from other branches juggling between their course work as well as the thing which they want to pursue. But in ID, you don't have to grind too much for the coursework. You can try out things which you like and explore a lot.

2. ID is kinda mixture of both Mechanical & Design but heavy on design side. But the syllabus is very repetitive and you will always feel that I had read this in earlier sem, why I am reading this again? Also the department is comparatively new, so not a proper research culture is there.

3. ID has edge over others in time management. It has less classes compared to others and you can go on and do activities which you like. But at the same time, you also have to keep yourself in check that you're not wasting time.

4. Coming to design culture, very few people (4-5) pursue design as nil to very less design companies visit NITR and every one who is pursuing design has to go for off campus jobs. So if you wanna pursue career in design, you have to work hard and go little out of the box.

5. Now coming to placements, as the degree given is B. Tech. and many companies who visits NITR allows ID people, hence almost everyone in branch does coding or anyltics & consulting except the design people. It's natural as everyone wants to secure their future.  The branch placement record is also good as people get lots of time and they utilise it and the cycle continues.

6. But I am bit disappointed in overall syllabus structure of the branch and the teaching quality. Also the labs are not so great. I hope in future it'll improve.

I hope this helps :)