Tag: student

“Guru Dakshina” – the Divine Manifestation of Giving Back to the Alma Mater

“Guru Dakshina hoye Guru ka Pratham Samman
Bhav Bhakti hoye Guru ka Pratham Upahaar
Shri Vasudev Krishna hoye Arjun ke Tattvagyaan
Ekalavya hoye Dronacharya ke  Aitihasik Guru Samman”

Guru Dakshina is the first respect that a student gives to his teacher
The emotional devotion of the students is his first present
Shri Krishna was the philosophical teacher for Arjun and
Ekalavya was Dronacharya’s respectful master from history

Guru Dakshina is the pure and selfless connection between a teacher and their disciple. By adhering to the qualities and learning of their Guru, the students bring the greatest smile of achievement, love, and gratitude on their teacher’s face as they share with them their Guru Dakshina. The belief of enriching the bond between the teacher and a student is what laid the foundation for Guru Dakshina. From setting the establishment of learning to fostering love for it, teachers diligently do a crucial job of making things simple for their students. Now it’s time for the students to pay back to the institution by tending to the most significant challenge before their teachers by paying them Gurudakshina.

A Guru does not ‘condition’ the minds of his disciples by the walls of his own ideas, but points out to them new and untried realms of contemplation.Our journey in life is incomplete without a Guru. A “Guru” leads us from the visible to the invisible, from the material to the divine, from the knowledge to the enlightenment and from the ephemeral to the eternal. The teachings and blessings of a Guru are the most prized possessions for his/her Shishya who acknowledges the Guru principle in their life. Based upon this principle, IIT Kharagpur launched an aesthetic giveaway in the form of Guru Dakshina, the Divine Manifestation of Giving back to the Alma Mater on 30th January at 5.30 in Netaji auditorium of the institute. The programme was launched by Prof. V K Tewari, Director, IIT Kharagpur in the august presence of Batch 1979, Prof. Amit Patra, Deputy Director; Prof. Debashish Chakravarty, Associate Dean, Alumni Affairs & International Relations; Captain Amit Jain (Retd.), Registrar and Cdr V K Jaitley, Distinguished Alumnus of IIT Kharagpur.

“It is such a great opportunity to launch Guru Dakshina in the presence of Batch 1979 who are revisiting the institute after a long gap. The idea of Guru Dakshina is to bring the Alumnus more closer to this institute and engage them to participate in the institutional development activities in an inclusive way,” said Prof. Debashish Chakravarty, Associate Dean, Alumni Affairs & International Relations while addressing the batch of 1979.

Cdr V K Jailtly (Retd.) gave a detailed presentation about the programme and how it will be implemented hence forth. He remarked, “A person who loves his teachers, his alma mater, this initiative is for them to do something for their alma mater which has helped them to be where they are today. This small gesture is a commitment towards making the institute stand on its feet and become self-reliant. Mr. Samarth Singh, Vice President, Technology Students Gymkhana was the first student who signed up the pledge for Guru Dakshina and stated that, “I think this is a very good initiative that will help the student community of this institute who fall short on fund utilization while organizing events and student welfare activities. Our senior have always stood for us in terms of providing financial aids for hostel amenities and other co-curricular activities.

Cdr V K Jaitly (Retd.) launches his book “100 Great IITians”

Guru Dakshina for My Alma Mater will be received from the Alumni of the institute which will help in making IIT Kharagpur Atmanirbhar over a period of time. The funds received through Guru Dakshina shall alleviate the challenge of collecting funds by the students for Spring Festival, Kshitij, Sports, Fest and even for increasing and improving Hall Amenities.

While those students in service, have been urged to contribute a months salary, entrepreneurs with profits in excess of Rs.  1 crore have been asked to donate 1% of the annual profits to the institute. Half the corpus created out of the donations will be set aside to make IIT Kharagpur self reliant. Of the rest, 20% will go into the welfare fund that can be used by the students and hall staffs and 15% each will be given to upgrade laboratories and facilities in the hostels.

Prof. V K Tewari, Director, IIT Kharagpur who is also an alumnus of the institute stated, “This initiative will strengthen the corpus of the institute and help the institute to become Atmanirbhar. This commitment from the Alumni will be a great help to the institute and the students. As you are aware that the institute has grown ten folds since how it started with only 224 students and 42 teachers in 1951 and now we have 16,000+ students and 700+ faculty. To maintain this ratio, the institute faces many challenges including fund utilization for redevelopment and maintenance of the common facilities. I will always be grateful to the Alumni who have risen up to the occasion and contributed during the Covid period and helped us and the community around the campus enormously. Their generous giveaway and token of appreciations have always been the driving force of this institute, therefore with their support and guidance we launch Guru Dakshina, which is a pledge that you take for your Alma Mater… your pride.”

 

Guru Dakshina will have two parts:

• By the Students

• By the Alumni

By The Students:

• The Ownership lies with Chairman, CDC for getting the pledge

• It shall be transferred to Dean Alumni Affairs, once the students pass out

• The students will pledge One Month’s Salary that they can pay at their convenience during 1st/2nd/3rd/4th/…. nth year of their profession.

• Some students may like to take this pledge even during their 3rd year or even earlier.

• Students who sign this pledge will be given a certificate of accreditation which they can show in their testimonials while appearing for their first job interview and can display later in their office.

By the Alumni:

• Ownership for this will be with Dean Alumni Affairs

• Alumni foundations in US and India with their chapters across the world will play an active role in giving publicity to this scheme and encouraging alumni to come forward and be part of this noble campaign.

• All the alumni from first batch of 1955 till today can donate their current one month’s salary/pension/income from their
industry/investments as their Guru Dakshina.

• Donation can be through e-transfer or any other means but not by cash and shall be presented a certificate of Accredation that he/she can display in their home/office

One of the batch-mates of Batch 1979 remarked,”Lets see that tangible improvement and process that will define progress is happening and I think that is very important. We need an audited report card that states how it was utilized, what is the satisfaction level, an independent audit not done by somebody. People will eventually give, knowing it is for a good cause, but if it is not like that you will be hesitant saying money down the drain. But thanks to this initiative, it is a good start, a beautiful start and a lot of thought has gone into this great job.”

Utilization of Guru Dakshina by Students

Only 50% of this money will be used by the institute to build up the corpus to make IIT Kharagpur Atmanirbhar, the rest will be utilized for the respective halls of the students, for the Gymkhana for SF, Kshitij etc., for their concerned departments and for the benevolent activities and emergency welfare of the students, alumni, staff, including non-teaching staff and even mess workers etc.

Utilization of Guru Dakshina by Alumni

50% of this money will be used by the institute to build up the corpus to make IIT Kharagpur Atmanirbhar and the rest for the respective halls of the students, for the Gymkhana for SF, Kshitij etc, for their concerned departments, for the benevolent activities and emergency welfare of the students, alumni, staff, including non-teaching staff and even mess workers etc., to the US/India Foundation, to the Chapter he/she belongs to (or to the concerned Foundation if no active chapter is there)

All other Endowments will continue

• All other donations of any amounts, however small they may be from the students and alumni shall continue as parts of Hall
Endowment/Deptt Endowment or Batch Endowments etc.

• For this Guru Dakshina scheme, a minimum of Rs 1 lakh pledge/donation will be required to be eligible to receive the Guru
Dakshina Certificate, preferably from the hands of Director of IIT Kharagpur.

Benefits:

• Funds for Hall renovations and new facilities will be available in abundance.

• Departments will get money to upgrade their labs or sponsor some global events in their departments.

• Funds for sudden medical emergencies etc. for some alumni/students/staff will be available.

• The corpus of the institute will start building up to great levels for IIT Kharagpur to become Atmanirbhar.

• Our mainly 1st and 2nd year students running around all over India to collect funds from our alumni for Spring Festival, Khshitij, Sports Meets etc. will not be required. Instead of that they may contact alumni to be part of Guru Dakshina Project.

Cdr V K Jaitly (Retd.) handing over his cheque of Rs. 1,24,360 and also the cheque of Rs. 2 lakhs by Virendra Kumar Goswami, Distinguished Alumnus of the institute to Guru Dakshina


How to Pay and Where to Pay?

• No Cash

• E-Transfer or By Cheque or Demand Draft

* For Salaried Alumni – Give One Month of My Salary to IIT Kharagpur

* For Entrepreneurs – Donate 1% of the annual profits to IIT Kharagpur as soon as profits cross 1 Crore per year

How Guru Dakshina to My Alma Mater will be used?

  1. 15% for the upgradation of labs etc in the respective department
  2. 15% for upgradation of facilities in the respective hall
  3. 20% for the Welfare Fund that can be used for students and hall staff
  4. 50% for corpus of the Institute to make IIT Kharagpur Self-reliant

For more details, please write to alumni@hijli.iitkgp.ac.in


Media Coverage:

     
Times of India                                                        Dainik Jagran

Inputs by: Cdr V K Jaitly (Retd.), Distinguished Alumnus of IIT Kharagpur 
Email: cdr.vk.jaitly@gmail.com

By: Poulami Mondal, Digital & Creative Media Executive (Creative Writer)
Email: poulami.mondal@iitkgp.ac.in, media@iitkgp.ac.in, Ph. No.: +91-3222-282007

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For news visit: https://kgpchronicle.iitkgp.ac.in/ 

Eat, pray, love Artificial Intelligence

In one of the most impressive student events organized at IIT Kharagpur, teachers, students, industry experts came together to talk Artificial Intelligence.

Spelled up.AI and pronounced “Upay” or ‘solution’ in Hindi, the up.AI summit from October 5-7 tried to delve into the problems – illiteracy, hunger, disease, natural disasters – and how AI can be used to solve them. Up.AI was organized by the Computer Science and Engineering Department of IIT Kharagpur and its newly established Centre of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence.

Students at the up.AI boot camp

The meet not only focused on the thematic areas of AI, but also its practical applications. Speakers, – teachers, industry heads, entrepreneurs and researchers – gave demonstrations of how AI was being used in their respective fields – be it retail, banking, healthcare, transport or education. Ms Swapna Agarwal, part of the Research and Innovation team of TCS in Kolkata, for example introduced the audience to her work in computer vision with specific emphasis on 3D point-cloud registration. A team associated with a top bank showed how AI was being used in risk analysis and assessing the credibility of start-ups. Mr Malaikannan Sankarasubbu, Vice-President, AI Research @Saama Technologies, explained how AI was being used in clinical trials, especially those of medicines. Mr Shailesh Kumar, Chief Data Scientist, Jio CoE in AI, showed how AI can revolutionize education (The most unique of the applications that Mr Kumar described was how AI could be used to teach students the art of thinking).

Prof. Plaban Kumar Bhowmick, Assistant Professor, Centre for Educational Technology explained how AI was being used extensively by IIT Kharagpur in the National Digital Library. Prof. Mrigank Sharad, Department of Electronics and Electrical Communication Engineering of IIT Kharagpur, and Director and CPO of AgNext, an IIT KGP startup, showed how AI is being used in crop-screening and in data-driven precision farming. Mr Rupak Kumar Thakur, Deep Learning Engineer at AgricX Lab, explained how his lab is using deep learning based computer vision algorithms to do quality assessment and standardization of agricultural produce with a focus on potato.

Prof. Sudeshna Sarkar, Head, CoE for AI

The audience at the up.AI summit not only included senior students at IIT Kharagpur who are already working on AI but also students from the first and second year. The message that went out to them from the speakers was simple. One, that India stands to benefit from AI in a big way. Professor Pallab Dasgupta of the Computer Science and Engineering Department and Dean, Sponsored Research and Consultancy, pointed out that just like IT had proved to be one of the wealth creators for India, AI would be equally beneficial for India, given that the country already had a lot going for it by way of digital penetration, its huge talent pool, and its proven ability to scale up new technology.

The other message that went out to the young audience was that instead of exploiting the hype around AI, they had to innovate and “create”. Mr Subrat Panda, Head of AI and Data Sciences at Capillary Technologies, clearly made that point during his virtual class from Bengaluru. Dr. Suryanil Ghosh, Chairman, TotalStart Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Developers, reminded students that they need to engage in interdisciplinary research since “The AI revolution in India will be driven by interdisciplinary collaboration in research.”

Lecture at up.AI summit

The point was reiterated during the panel discussion, which also highlighted several other problem areas. The panel included faculty, students as well as experts like Suddha Sattwa Kundu, VP Head, Retail Risk Loss Forecasting, Collections & Fraud Prevention Strategy of HSBC Technology and Services, and Mr Kumar of Jio Center in AI. It was pointed out that the toughest challenge in Machine Learning is data acquisition, and that students tended to prefer projects for which data is available. The other point highlighted was the lack of gender diversity in the community working on ML. It was suggested that student groups like ‘Lean In Tech’ could encourage girls interested in ML/AI to come forward in this arena.

IIT Kharagpur has been using AI extensively for the past few years. A recent survey by SRIC showed as many as 83 of its Faculty use AI in their work. The enthusiasm surrounding AI was palpable in the enormous crowd of close to a thousand students who congregated at the boot camp on October 5, prior to the beginning of the summit . The bootcamp introduced attendant students to theory, implementation and deployment of AI-powered algorithms. The event also featured a Deep Learning Quiz. It was followed by a contest named J.A.R.V.I.S. Chronicles that saw overwhelming participation.

Demonstration at the boot camp

The up.AI summit has led to a larger competition termed up.AI Challenge. Till October 21, students will have time to form teams and present proposals for projects dealing with AI. Under the mentorship of IIT Kharagpur professors, 10 select projects will be incubated during the winter vacation and in a competition to be held in January 2019, the best among them will be awarded. As Professor Sudeshna Sarkar, head CoE for AI, said, “The idea was to have some AI related activity going on at IIT Kharagpur. There is a lot of enthusiasm among the students and events like the up.AI meet will not only encourage students but also inform, shape up and channelize creativity. All this is great for the newly-established CoE for AI.”

Prof. Partha Pratim Chakrabarti, Director, IIT Kharagpur, said, “The talent and interest in AI in IIT KGP, and the support from others is incredible. We need to make it happen more and more. Thanks to Anirban Santara and Team up.AI for organizing the event at IIT KGP. Let’s take this movement forward.”