THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUEIIT KHARAGPURNOVEMBER 13 2009

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haurya, the annual sports meet sizeable and boisterous attendance. Sof IIT Kharagpur, saw its second The addition of 3 tourneys for girls edition kick off in a much bigger and this year also drew in a considerable grander avatar on 23rd September audience. Fun, off-beat games like with a glittering inauguration Archery, Mini-footer, Sudoku, ceremony which set the tone for the Kabaddi and Darts ensured that the remainder of this event. Featuring 11 throngs stuck around the arena even games which were competed in by between events.12 colleges comprising a total of about 500 participants, the second IIT Kharagpur managed a edition of Shaurya completely decent overal l performance dwarfed its predecessor in sheer including a nail-biting loss in the scale of participation. basketball final. With match

exposure against a host of good Shaurya created quite a buzz on teams, our inter-IIT teams are sure

campus during its length of four to have benefitted from this days and almost all games saw sporting extravaganza.

Meets and fests are opportunities for the students who lock themselves in their rooms playing computer games to come out and socialize.

- Prof. Manish Bhattacharjee

The Scholars’ Avenue caught up with President, TSG, Professor Manish Bhattacharjee, and G.Sec. Sports Angam Parashar for a few quick words

on the Sports fest.

On the Shaurya experience.Angam: First and foremost, I am pleased with the professional manner in which the event was conducted. The inauguration ceremony was particularly impressive with Chief Guest Pranab Roy (former BCCI Chief Selector) kicking off this exciting event. The ceremony also included a performance by India's Got Talent semifinalist Uttam Das. I was disappointed, though, with IIT Kharagpur's performance: Even though we reached the finals of a few events, we could only bag one gold. Our performance in table tennis was poor though we managed a good show in volleyball and lost a thrilling basketball final against St. Xavier's College. The same college defeated us in the football finals too and we were knocked out in the cricket semifinals. On a slightly unrelated note, I would like to make special mention of NIT Trichy, which sent its contingent to all the games. The fun games which were organized for the crowd's

THentertainment were a huge success and the marathon on the 25 drew hundreds of participants including the Director of our institute.

On sponsorshipAngam: Shaurya is now a sports fest with a budget that was 15 times larger than last year. One major accomplishment of the Shaurya core team this time was arranging for sponsorship. Permission to look for sponsorship was granted sometime around Dussehra, and after that all the work was completed in a very short period of 15-20 days. The funds raised were enough to cover the entire event with Gymkhana money acting as a buffer.

Prof. M Bhattacharjee: This year, some of the sponsors contributed in kind, and this is alright with us. We need the money as well. So a part of it came from the companies while the rest was from the Institute. Usually, we call teams for Inter-IIT practice. Some of this budget has been redirected to fund the meet. We want to refrain from completely banking on the sponsors. Sports and Games is a serious issue and with Inter-IIT in mind, we cannot give sponsors full control.

On Inter-IITAngam: After playing teams from other colleges in Shaurya, we are now more aware of our mistakes and our priority now is to improve in these areas. Some sports in KGP suffer because of factors that are not under our control. All we can do is focus on doing our part right.

Prof. M Bhattacharjee: This year, we opted for practice throughout the year. And then, there's Shaurya.

On the duration of the eventAngam: The event spanned over 4 days this time and this format will be preserved next year.

Prof. M Bhattacharjee: Next year, we would like to decrease the number of teams in a few events, marginally though. This is to accommodate the event in two and a half days. This year, with a tight schedule, we were stretched to include a working day. We will look to avoid this in future

Shaurya ’09

n an evening that saw many ups and downs, exemplary performances were the order of the day at the WTMS 2009 productions, not the least being Ankit Prasad’s rendition of the Comfortably Numb solo backed onscreen by the P.U.L.S.E video.O

2 C A R E E R S A V E N U E THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009

Startup Feature - Capillary Bangalore based start up, Capillary provides mobile based customer management solutions, meaning it helps businesses understand the needs of and effectively communicate with their customers through mobile services. One of the co-founders of Capillary, Krishna Mehra (06, RK, ACS) shares his experience with us.

In Kgp, it’s all "peace" as we all like to say, but once you step out, you suddenly need to do a lot of learning.

TEAM SCHOLSAVE

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Executive Editors : D e e p a k C h e r i a n , M i t h u n Madhusudan

Editors: AVN Murthy, Bharath Bhat, Dheeraj Golla, Mayank Kedia, Pallavi Jayannavar, Siddharth Prabhu, Siddharth Singh

Asst. Editors: Abhirajika A, Amiya Adwitiya, Arvind Sowmyan, Ratan J S, Tiyasa Mitra, Vijay, Sumeet Mohanty

Reporters: Achyut Bihani, Chirag Tibrewal, Deepesh Kumar, Hridya Ravimohan, Indra Saha, Mahtab Soin, Parth Govil, Rishabh Poddar

Junior Reporters: Abhijeet T, Ajay Viswanathan, Koulick Ghosh, Pranav Rao, Pravin Sharma

Anup Bishnoi,

KM: Our first financing was from IIT Kharagpur, through TIETS, for which we will be forever grateful. It helped us start out and take small risks without which we wouldn't have moved an inch. Qualcomm (The B-Plan Competition where Capillary stood first in India) is the first private fund we are working with.

I personally believe, the right time is when you have a clear idea for a product and have validation t h r o u g h i n t e r e s t e d / p a y i n g

TSA: When did you start your we need to do a lot of institutional this field? customers. Everybody wants to see company? Was it immediately after sales, and work experience gives us a market traction before giving out college or after some job experience? better understanding of client KM: Our competitors include money, and it is important to be

requirements and organisational marketing services companies like able to clearly demonstrate the Krishna Mehra: Going back a few structures, and a better network to SurfGoal, Wunderman, Accentive traction and value proposition for years, Aneesh (Aneesh Reddy, RK, start off with. At the same time, and IT vendors like Shawman and your customer before you look at 06) and I were both wingies, and Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, and Pine Labs. institutional capital. Of course there Ajay (Ajay Modani, RK, 07) was a Facebook were all created without are exceptions as is the case with year junior. We had always been any work experience! When we started, we realized that businesses with high cost of product interested in entrepreneurship and many of the assumptions with development.h a d i n f a c t s t a r t e d t h e which this industry worked had Entrepreneurship Cell under the TSA: How did you develop the changed dramatically with the TSA: Where do you see your guidance of SRIC/TIETS in our technology that you are currently emergence of the ubiquitous mobile company in the next 5 years? Are you final year. I had also worked in a employing in your venture? How phone, and we decided to re-think planning on branching out to startup (Minekey Inc.) in my final effective is the form of marketing that the solution to be more effective anything new?year which went on to raise $3m you use? and topical from ground up. We from NEA. However, both of us focussed on greater returns for the KM: We want to be the preferred accepted jobs - I joined Microsoft Initial development was done by us, retailers and giving them more customer engagement program in Research but the itch to R e t u r n o n India - with a presence in tens of start up was there, Investment through thousands of retail outlets. We want especially due to the simple and effective to make our product more wonderful experience I tools. sophisticated and effective.had in my final year. At the same time, Aneesh In the beginning, TSA: Last, but not the least. What worked in ITC Ltd. We we couldn't integrate was your CG?started after about 2 with any software years of job experience because IT vendors KM: 9.76!each, and Ajay joined us from along with some students from Kgp were unwilling to work with us. We Danieli soon after, racked our brains who helped and interned with us. had to take the battle into their around, did a fair bit of mindless Now, we have a small technology t e r r i to ry by au tomat i c a l l y running around in front of clients development team that’s taking care integrating without their help using before we got out first break. of product development. innovative means. The fact that we

didn't carry any baggage in terms of TSA: Would you advise your juniors We are into institutional sales - previous industry knowledge to start-up immediately after college this requires a fair bit of business helped us think from first principles or after ample job-experience? development. It's not the traditional and come up with better answers to

consumer-facing business, but some of the problems and build a KM: I would strongly suggest some involves Business to Business sales, competitive advantage.work experience, since it really for which a different sales strategy is prepares you for a different kind of required. We are currently working TSA: What was your first shot at life, and makes you take life and with about 300 stores in more than Venture Capitalist (VC) money? work much more seriously. In Kgp, 75 cities in India. When, according to you is the it’s all "peace" as we all like to say, appropriate time for a young but once you step out, you suddenly TSA: What kind of competition do entrepreneur to think about VC need to do a lot of learning. It also you have in India? Can you elaborate funding in the course of his/her depends on the kind of company on your experiences in dealing with venture?you wish to create. In our company, competition when you first entered

The confusion that led to the idea of pre-registration, the subsequent confusion that ensued, the pandemonium during registration, the umpteen trips to professors to check your grades, and the seemingly disorganized state of nearly everything (academic or otherwise) in the institute. These are some of the major headaches that have been plaguing students. With the ERP system in place (https://erp.iitkgp.ernet.in) since 21 January 2009, these services ought to become infinitely easier, accessible and transparent. The functions earlier carried out by the UGS site will now be solely under the domain of this system, which will be accessible 24 hours a day. Though the ERP system is not yet fully functional, it is at present sufficiently braced to carry out the pre-registration and professor feedback procedures. The administration has made it mandatory that all students fill in the feedback forms for all professors as well as pre-register their options for breadth courses, additionals and electives before they leave the institute. These functions will be open to students starting 13 November 2009. All ERP related information a student would be required to be aware of is available through video streams on an internal site at http://10.35.32.40. The helpline numbers for any enquiries about the system are 81017, 81018 and 81019. The operating hours of the helpline are 9:00 am to 6:00 pm. Keep checking www.scholarsavenue.org for more details.

UGS SITE - A THING OF THE PAST!

N E W S A V E N U ETHE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009 3

he Minister of State for External Affairs, Shashi Tharoor, announced that the Government is planning to set up seventy-seven Passport T

Seva Kendras (PSKs) in various parts of the country to speed up the process of issuing passports. Kharagpur is to have one of the five PSKs planned for West Bengal, with two others being set up in Kolkata.

This is welcome news for students on campus, as getting a passport issued or renewed has always been a big hassle involving at least a few trips to Kolkata.

According to Mr. Tharoor, the process of issuing or renewing passports will become a lot easier with lower processing time and a provision for online applications. If the Project is implemented successfully, new passports will be issued within three working days and a ‘tatkal’ one the same day, after a police verification. After assessing the functioning of the first few PSKs, the others should be set up by January 2010.

Kharagpur to have a Passport Seva Kendra s part of its inaugural Aexcursion, the newly formed

Technology Adventure Society (TAdS) organized a trek in West Sikkim from the 23rd to the 30th of September this year. Under the initiative of students Ankit Joshi (GSec Sports), Kushal Suhasaria and Shekhar Suman and with the support of President Sudhir Sarkar, a group of 21 students undertook the journey. They were accompanied by Sudhir sir from the Gymkhana. With the intent of minimizing risk, a professional organization's help was sought and a Letter of Consent obtained from the participating students' parents.

A journey by train to New Jalpaiguri followed by a minibus trip brought the team to the base camp of Yuksam, from where began the 30 km trek on foot to Dzongri

Pass, situated in the Kanchenjunga National Park. As evidenced by the group, the trek was by no means simple, and steep climbs, low oxygen and nights in tents were some of the unique albeit taxing experiences. At the summit, the sight of a chain of snowy, majestic mountains lighting up with the spreading rays of a rising sun at 4,300 m was literally the high point of the trip.

With plans to include girls in their future ventures, arrangements f o r r ock c l imb ing a round Jamshedpur with the aid of the Tata Steel Adventure Foundation in late December/early January and ideas of a trek to Leh next summer that would include even professors, TAdS looks set to extend its vertical limits and offer KGPians a true taste of adventure.

TAdS' Yuksam Dzongri Trek

echnology Dance Society Tconducted X-Quisite, an open-to-all dance workshop organised by experts from the society itself from 23rd to 27th October 2009, s u c c e s s f u l l y teaching various genres of dance such as hip-hop, salsa, popping a n d l o c k i n g , c l a s s i c a l and “bollywood” to a full house of eager attendees. Their zone of operation was the Vikramshila foyer and they charged an amount of Rs.100 per student for the event. This was the first instance of such a workshop on campus and is an

Dance Pe Chance!interesting initiative to propagate the art of dance among the students in general. Registrations were full 2 days before the event and it saw a sizeable turnout, consisting mainly

of first years. Notably, days like that of the salsa workshop saw a more even gender ratio than one w o u l d g e n e r a l l y imagine in our b l e s s e d c a m p u s . M a y b e t h e

future holds further unforeseen possibilities. Here's hoping we continue to see such ventures from TDS.

UN Promotes IIT -Developed Forecast System

Remote-sensing Satellite (ERS), TOPEX and Poseidon, and provides information on whether the sea is rough or navigable. It helps to optimize the sea-route that a ship should take in order to minimize fuel consumption and time.

The Indian Meteorological a l a m i t i e s s u c h a s t h e Department (IMD), Indian Navy, CBangladesh cyclone of 1991 Coast Guard and Indian National

and the Orissa super-cyclone of Centre for Ocean Information 1999 bring to mind the absolute S e r v i c e s ( I N C O I S ) h a v e destruction it leaves in its wake, implemented these systems real-taking the lives of thousands of time. The World Meteorological people and causing damage worth Organisation (WMO), the official crores. These disasters have wing of the United Nations in the prompted fervent study in this area. field on weather, has taken the onus For nearly 20 years, research to transfer this technology to other directed towards improving the coastal countries around the world. forecasting system for such It is currently being implemented in meteorological developments has the SAARC countries and being been carried out at IIT-D. The considered for use in Canada. It Storm Surge System, developed by gives an estimate of the extent to Prof. S.K. Dubey, ex-Director of IIT which evacuation is needed to Kharagpur, predicts the rise in water ensure safety of people during an level at the coast when a low- emergency. The United Nations, pressure system, such as a cyclone, through the WMO, plans to hits land. The Ocean State Forecast integrate these two systems into one System, worked upon by Prof. P.K. to provide a more comprehensive Bhaskaran of the Department of and helpful forecast and thereby Ocean Engineering and Naval enable safer sea-travel and minimize Architecture, uses inputs from destruction in case of natural satellites such as the European disasters.

n the light of the upcoming Iplacement season, we caught up with the Gymkhana Vice President Shubham Matah to see how far he has taken his proposal to improve campus placements, the success or failure of which may prove vital on a recession-hit year that hints at being just as tough on fresh graduates as the last one.

One of the most promising measures that the VP had set out to accomplish was organizing mock GD/PI sessions for all the students who registered for placements, which were supposed to

have happened in mid-October (according to his estimation during our last interview). Unfortunately, Matah informs us that this will not be happening this time around due to insufficient funds. The amount allocated to this project by the Registrar was a mere 1/4th of what was needed. In place of what would have been an extremely beneficial one-on-one session with professionals, final year students will have to make do with just a seminar that is slated to happen sometime during November.

Also meeting with delays was the plan to have student profile pages hosted on the IIT-KGP site. This project has been taken up by the Dean of Co-ordination and Planning and is likely to be completed this time next year.

On a happier note, one of the measures that were taken by the VP in relation to placements did bear fruit – namely, the appointment of Department Representatives. According to him, it has been "100% effective" in getting new companies for placements.

The VP on Placements

4 SPECIAL FEATURE THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009 THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009 5 SPECIAL FEATURE

he year was 1948. The increasing exchange of information across the world was having its first effects on the remote villages of Telangana, where the villagers, inspired by the Chinese Red revolution and the T

principles of ‘New Democracy’ laid down by Mao Zedong, decided to launch the Telangana struggle against the feudal nature of the Nizam governed state of Hyderabad. They forcibly evicted the landlords and redistributed the land among the peasants. Led by the Communist Party of India, the armed struggle managed to establish a ‘village rule’ in over 3000 villages (41000 sq kilometers). The struggle formally came to an end in 1951, after the accession of Hyderabad into the Indian Union in 1949.

The importance of this struggle lies in the fact that it brought to the forefront of the Indian communist movement almost all the basic theoretical and ideological questions regarding the Indian people’s democratic revolution. This early success also laid down the roots of the Naxal movement in India.

By the early 1960’s the Communist Party of India had expanded its reach, yet the revolution that they had been looking and waiting for did not happen. In 1965 the CPI split up into the CPI (Marxist) and the CPI, with the CPI (M) looking to enter parliamentary democracy and postpone the idea of an armed struggle till the necessary revolutionary backdrop was there. In 1967, the same year as the CPI (M) led United Front, formed the state government in West Bengal, the Naxalbari uprising occurred (see box1). This uprising echoed throughout India and Naxalism was born. Charu Majumdar, who had written the Historic Eight Documents (see box2), spearheaded the Naxalite movement. This movement assumed larger dimensions as the party machinery of CPI in UP, J&K and some parts of Bihar and Andhra Pradesh joined the fray.

The same year the All India coordination committee of communist revolutionaries (AICCCR) was formed with the objective of leading an armed struggle against the Indian state for the setting up of a communist state.

The Naxalites began with a strategy of total annihilation of ‘class enemies’; landlords, corrupt police and state officials who colluded to oppress the peasants. Yet the movement failed to attain mass support except in some places across the country.

What it did though, was to capture the imagination of the young intelligentsia who, charged by the revolutionary fervor of their counterparts across the world (the Vietnam War protests, Hungarian revolution), were inspired to join the ‘revolution’ happening in their own backyard. College campuses like St. Stephens

in Delhi and Presidency in Kolkata turned into Naxal sympathizers. Yet this overtly violent route to revolution left most students, who went in to the heartlands of the country to join the Naxalites, disillusioned. Added to that, the brutality with which the Indian state chose to stub the movement discouraged many.

The Naxal movement wasn’t a single political unit or even a single ideological unit. There were always a multitude of ideological and political factions, these weakened the movement as well as made it difficult for the state to crush it. The Naxalite movement evolved ideologically through the decades, endeavoring to Indianise the Marxist-Leninist-Mao thought and then later to focus on a proletariat mass movement. Small incidents in various parts of the country at regular intervals helped stoke the fire from time to time. The movement kept on churning, bring newer sections of the society into its fold, leaving older ones out. By the 90’s Naxalite movement still remained a minor law and order problem since it affected only a small part of the country. Then two things happened.

The liberalization of the Indian economy brought with it industrialization. The state had turned capitalist. The communist party of Nepal (Maoist) and various other Maoists in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka joined hands with their Indian counterparts. These two factors predominantly caused the rapid growth of the Naxalite movement in the late 90’s. Industry needed land. This land was being acquired from tribals and peasants. The arbitrary manner in which land was acquired caused deep resentment. This sentiment was harnessed by the Maoists who launched their own protests against the state. Violence also escalated in part due to the superior training and weapons, the Naxalites recieved due to their Inter-National co-operation. Today Naxalites make their presence felt in more than 220 districts of the country, and according to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh constitutes ‘the single biggest Internal security challenge’ to India.

Security in and around campus

The plan includes more CCTVs, sophisticated devices and equipment like lie detectors, under car mirrors amongst others. The academic area, part of the Scholars’ Avenue lane, Tikka’s and Tech market have already been placed under surveillance. The sniffer dogs, major deterrents for criminals, patrol once each in the morning, evening and night and have been quite effective in bringing down the crime graph.

“Security is our primary concern. In fact, the recent developments are the brainchild of our Director himself. We plan to install more CCTVs once we set up the WiFi network which would save us the cost of expensive wiring. However, a lot still needs to be done,” he adds.

The entry and exit points of the hostels are also to be placed under surveillance. Presently, the data recorded by the cameras is stored for 15 days. Authorities claim that this practice has vastly improved their capability to detect crimes and offences. Nevertheless, these measures, which students term as a gross breach of their privacy, are being greeted with a mix of, to varying degrees, skepticism and apprehension. Mr. U.P Singh is quick in clarifying his stand.

“We appeal to the students and expect proper cooperation from them. It should be a give and take policy. We are not the police. We can just help in strengthening the preventive mechanisms in place. We are extremely concerned about their security and in return we expect a little assistance and tolerance from their part.”

He is extremely clear about the near foolproof security at the four entrance points to the campus. He emphasizes that the people being let in without mandatory checks are those whose credentials have been double checked and documented earlier and are familiar to the security. Despite the shortage of manpower, which cannot be dramatically increased due to managerial and financial constraints, the current staffing of security personnel is perfectly capable of manning the vast campus.

However, IIT Kharagpur is one of the premier institutions in the country. With its impeccable brand image, IIT Kharagpur is recognized as an indispensable asset to the country, and always will be on the radar of anti- nationalistic elements. The growing red insurgency in West Bengal which is slowly but steadily inching towards the campus should also be a matter of great concern.

Despite the reassurances, in a country plagued with constant terror threats and the ever increasing boldness of the Naxalites, it’s injudicious and unfair to expect an impervious and impenetrable security apparatus. The administration, more than anyone else, knows that failure is not an option.

As U.P Singh himself accepts, “No security organization in the world can guarantee absolute security. We can only strive for maximum security. Terror strikes can occur anywhere. Be it the IISc Bangalore shootout or the serial Mumbai blasts, the incidents are innumerable.”

However, strengthening one’s defenses is the only way forward and the recent efforts of the administration are quite commendable and definitely need to be appreciated.

The changes are being made and the ball is now in our court. It’s up to us to respect it and abide by it. And as the saying goes, “Only in growth, reform, and change, paradoxically enough, is true security to be found.”

Here’s hoping for an incident free campus.

t’s not quite often you find sniffer dogs staring at you menacingly outside the academic complex of an educational establishment located in a relatively tranquil environment. That’s the new face of IIT Kharagpur. In a drastic shift I

in its policies, keeping in mind the ever escalating terror threats in the country, the Institute is all set to receive a massive security overhaul. With twelve CCTVs (closed circuit television cameras) already installed at vital locations, 2 professionally trained sniffer dogs on the prowl and a slew of other such measures in the pipeline, students and faculty alike can finally afford to feel safe.

Now the obvious question - Why this sudden awakening and the subsequent flurry of activity? Is it in response to some specific intelligence reports or is it because of the heightened Naxalite threat, whose increasing proximity to the campus has already surpassed normal comfort levels.

“These are not special measures. Neither is it a knee jerk reaction to some particular directive from the intelligence agencies. It’s just part of a mega plan to beef up the internal security. Amid the volatile situation in the country and the growing population density in the campus, we felt that the least we could do with was increased vigilance and accountability,” says security officer Mr. U.P Singh.

In a remote village called Naxalbari in West Bengal, a tribal youth named Bimal Kisan, having obtained a judicial order, went to plough his land on 2nd March 1967. The local Landlords attacked him with the help of their goons. Tribal people of the area retaliated and started forcefully recapturing their land. What followed was a rebellion which left one police inspector and nine tribals dead. The Maoists then led by Charu Majumdar carried on an armed rebellion in Naxalbari for 72 days.

The ‘Historic Eight Documents’ form most of the basis for the Naxalite militant communist ideology. These are a set of eight monographs authored by Charu Majumdar during 1965-66 on the Marxist-Leninist-Mao thought. It proclaimed that the Indian state was a bourgeois state and that the major Communist parties had surrendered their ideals by agreeing to participate in parliamentary democracy. It advocated an armed Maoist struggle to overthrow the Indian state.

Post Independence Ideological structure within India

INC – predominantly democratic, socialistM K Gandhi – believed in village economy (mistrust for communism)Nehru – inspired by USSR, democratic socialistCPI – communist : Maoist, MarxistJan Sangh and other Hindu Nationalist Parties – Right wing capitalistMuslim League and other Muslim parties – Right Wing CapitalistIndian state – democratic socialistRural masses – primarily unaware, undecided

Security is our primary concern. In fact, the recent developments are the brainchild of our Director himself. We plan to install more CCTVs once we set up the WiFi network which would save us the cost of expensive wiring. However, a lot still needs to be done.

- Security Officer U P Singh

6 T E C H A V E N U E THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009

Product Design in FocusTSA takes a look at the innovations of PI ‘09

roduct Design 2009, a part of the annual Technology General P

Championships held on the 25th of October saw the best technical minds on campus coming up with a variety of inventions and battling it out for the top spot. The various teams were judged on the basis of Feasibility, Design, Innovation and Utility of their products. In addition, the participants were questioned on detailed technical aspects of the products by the professors judging the event and points were awarded for Presentation and Discussion as well.

2nd Runners-Up: MS Hall

The Interactive Rural Information System (IRIS) was MS Hall's Bronze

winning entry for this year's competition. Essentially an internet based information system, IRIS scores over ITC's existing e-choupal system in several ways.

The e-choupal system offers farmers all information about products and services they need to enhance farm productivity , improve farm-gate price realization and cut transaction costs. Farmers can access this information from the village itself through the web portal in Indian languages. However, this system entails an extremely high cost of installation and uses a dial-up connection.

IRIS on the other hand runs at a low cost, thanks to some intelligent engineering, competitive pricing and the latest technology. Unlike e-choupal, IRIS uses the wireless GPRS mob i l e n e twork t o communicate with central servers set up across the country. This can enable the product to have a

substantially further reach of even one system per village. A prime feature of this product is its radically new-user-friendly interface, which has features like user-modifiable language settings and a multilingual text to speech conversion engine, effectively eliminating the operator charges that the ITC model incurred and enabl ing use irrespective of education or background. A powerful server n e t w o r k f a c i l i t a t e s r a p i d centralization and decentralization of information.

The features can be extended to incorporate a lot of other uses, such as disaster mitigation features, e-banking, user-specific services using a unique national ID card number and other PC features.

The icing on the cake is that each terminal costs just Rs. 3300 to s e t - u p , a n d t h e n o m i n a l maintenance charges are taken care of through advertising.

Runners-Up : RP Hall

With the noble intention of curtailing the difficult problem of over-speeding

on roads that cause an increasing number of fatalities year after year all over the world, RP Hall presented S.P.E.C.T.R.E (short form for SPEed ConTrol and REgulation system). This entry managed to bag the second place in the competition.

Unlike current provisions to detect over-speeding, S.P.E.C.T.R.E is a fully automated system that eliminates the need for a supervising authority. It comes with a mechanism to alert the driver in case the speed limit is breached and t a k e c o r r e c t i v e m e a s u r e s immediately to bring the situation under control.

Designed to serve as an add-on to existing vehicles, S.P.E.C.T.R.E

essentially comprises of a butterfly valve to control the air-flow intake in the engine. The valve aperture changes in discreet steps thus achieving speed control by regulating the air-flow into the engine.

Roadside transmitters send an encoded signal about the speed limit to the sensory mechanism. Sensors and accelerometers send their data to the microprocessor unit which electronically controls the valve to keep the vehicle under the speed limit. A driver alert system visually informs the driver about the current and the maximum permissible

speed and sends out an audio alert in case the vehicle overshoots. To top it all off, this system comes with an ingenious tamper-proof system which sends out a signal in case of discrepancy and automatically shuts down the valve.

W i t h a p r i c e t a g o f approximately Rs. 5300, this product can surely go a long way in bringing down the alarming accident rate on roads.

Winners: Nehru Hall

The world’s present water crisis is largely manifest not due to the lack of physical water,

but due to the lack of proper cleansing techniques. The water purification practices used today depend heavily on electricity.

However, nearly 44 million Indians do not have access to electricity.

Winners Nehru Hall presented Jeevan Dhara - a hand-pump with a non-e lec t r i c , s e l f - f i l t r a t ion mechanism which aims to put an end to the country’s drinking water shortage.

Jeevan Dhara makes use of a piston, crank shaft, valves and a gear mechanism to reduce mechanical effort and create the pressure difference (of around 6 A.T.M) required for the filtration. The pre-filtration procedure involving sand, gravel and activated charcoal to remove large wastes and bacteria

isn’t a new technique. But the main innovation of this product is the use of these along with an ultra-filtration membrane to remove viruses and a nano-filtration mechanism to remove harmful heavy metals like lead, mercury and nickel, thus removing all harmful substances and providing safe drinking water. This can be further customized to remove a wide variety of harmful substances. And the kicker: the cost of purified water produced is estimated at 2 paise/litre, while conventional desalination plants generate water at 2.5 paise/litre.

Another major advantage is that Jeevan Dhara would continue to provide safe drinking water even during f loods , because the mechanism is completely sealed. This simple, yet cost effective way would ensure the availability of pure drinking water in rural areas.

bout a quarter of a century Abefore Apple would make the touch screen a ubiquitous means of computer interaction and just after the single-button mouse on the first Macintosh had made its appearance, the idea that fingers could interact with a computer more effectively was presented at a certain conference in Monterey, California. The man presenting it was Nicholas Negroponte. The conference - the brainchild of Richard Saul Wurman - was intended to bring together stalwarts from the fields of Technology, Entertainment and Design under one roof in order to "leverage the power of ideas to

change the world". And change the world it did. This was the birth of the TED, a non-profit organisation d e v o t e d t o " i d e a s w o r t h spreading".

Since its humble b e g i n n i n g s , t h i s organisation has grown in leaps and bounds. Thus far, speakers have included presidents, p r i m e m i n i s t e r s , leaders of industry and Nobel laureates. TED talks are for invitees only and most of the attendees have been extremely successful in some field

or other, thus making sure that the ideas presented at these talks go on to form thriving organisations. For the first time, TED came to India

t h i s y e a r , w i t h TEDIndia held at the Infosys Campus in Mysore last weekend.

Among the great p r e s e n t a t i o n s a t TEDIndia was ‘Sixth Sense’ by Pranav Mistry, who has a M.Des. from IITB and is now a

graduate student at MIT. Sixth Sense uses a camera and a projector to turn any surface - a wall or an object, into

a screen. All the hardware is bundled into a wearable package which is hooked up to a smartphone in your pocket. The system allows you to use natural hand movements and gestures to interact with everyday objects. Imagine using your palm as a cellphone and your wall as a canvas! Pranav Mistry has announced that he will make this technology open source within a month, with the intention of changing the lives of India's poor. It is ideas like these, with their world altering capabilities, presented to such a receptive audience, that make the TED Talks so great.

The Future BeckonsTED comes to India

Schematic : S.P.E.C.T.R.E Air-valve

8 A D A V E N U E THE SCHOLARS’ AVENUE ² FRIDAY , NOVEMBER 13TH 2009

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