Month: November 2019

Work some, play some more

Work some, play some more

The day started early for the participants of IIT Kharagpur’s Young Innovators Program 2019 on November 9. The stakes were high, and so there was not a moment to lose. By the time the judges trooped in on Day 2 of YIP 2019, the teams were ready by their tables at the Vikramshila foyer. And what a display it was! From live demonstration of how the green dispenser could provide water to the differently-abled, to moving hoover buses on a live model of an urban scene, a mini-model of a greenhouse that can monitor the growth of plant and fish…
Read More
The show begins

The show begins

The IIT Kharagpur campus came alive today with the arrival of 32 teams of school children from all over India, as well as east and west Asia for the Young Innovators Program. For many of the children and their teachers and parents, it had been a long journey from home, but the excitement of reaching their destination and being part of the milling crowd of participants and guests refreshed them in no time. The children especially got down to the business of knowing each other almost immediately. As the day wore off, it was difficult to believe that some of…
Read More
What’s in my water?

What’s in my water?

Tomatoes grown with the contaminated water of the Varthur Lake of Bengaluru reach the nearby markets of the city every morning and are bought by unsuspecting city dwellers. Almost a decade of civic activism in Bengaluru has not changed anything for either the farmers or urbanites there. Thousands of miles away, Platypuses, a mammal species commonly found in Australia, happily swim near the coast off Melbourne, unaware that beta-blockers are entering their bodies every day from the ‘safe’ treated water discharged from the city. These were some of the many facts brought to light by the Indo-Australia joint workshop on…
Read More
Gandhipedia

Gandhipedia

The Hindu BusinessLine      The Hindu        Careers360        The Week         India Today (Web)       India Today      Deccan herald        News18        Hindustan Times     Indian Express             NDTV          Jagran           IndiaTV             OrissaPost          Business Standard          The Statesman           Financial Express                        IIT KGP has…
Read More
Dream Catcher

Dream Catcher

“Farrokh’s passion is to have fun in providing an opportunity for highly motivated and talented people to learn how to define and achieve their dreams.” That is how University of Oklahoma’s Gallogly College of Engineering, Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, introduces the incumbent of its L.A. Comp Chair - Professor Farrokh Mistree. When I ask him about this rather unusual passion during his recent visit to IIT Kharagpur, Professor Mistree (1967/BTech/NA/AZ) tells me his life story. That is, his journey from being a student of naval architecture at IIT Kharagpur to holding the prestigious L.A. Comp Chair at the University of…
Read More
Gaaner Opaarey – My Parallel Universe of Rabindrasangeet

Gaaner Opaarey – My Parallel Universe of Rabindrasangeet

The first person to introduce me to Tagore’s music was my mother, a trained Rabindrasangeet singer herself and alumna of ‘Geetabitan’ an eminent music institute in Kolkata. Thus, one could say, I was born listening to Tagore’s songs. My mother introduced me to my first gurus - Shri Sailen Basu Roychowdhury and his wife, Smt Kamala Basu – both renowned Rabindrasangeet exponents of the time. I believe, whenever a child is exposed to something over a sustained period very early in life, it leaves an indelible impression on her mind. It becomes difficult for the child to dissociate herself from…
Read More