IIT-Madras, Lafarge to launch cement research project

Chennai: The first joint project by French cement major Lafarge Group's research arm and the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) is expected to kick start soon, an official said here on Wednesday.

Speaking to reporters, Revindra Gettu, professor at IIT-M's Department of Civil Engineering, said the research project will test the durability of concrete as a building material in different climatic conditions.

The cement major's research arm, Lafarge Research Centre, and IIT-M last year signed aMemorandum of Understanding, under which the IIT's civil engineering department set up a laboratory to carry out joint research programmes.

Lafarge Research Centre has funded the laboratory to the tune of Rs.1.5 crore over a period of three years.

According to Gettu, the tests will be conducted on concrete in different parts of India to identify the carbonation and its effects on concrete in different atmospheric conditions.

"Lafarge aims to improve the performance of concrete to address sustainable construction and global warming challenges. This is done through cutting-edge scientific research and forming partnerships with other institutes and organizations," said Pascal Casanova, head of Lafarge Group's Research and Development.

The French group has four cement plants in India - two in Chhattisgarh, and one grinding plant each in Jharkhand and West Bengal. Lafarge has also set up a gypsum plasterboard plant at Khushkhera in Rajasthan.

source:http://indiaedunews.net/IIT/IIT-Madras,_Lafarge_to_launch_cement_research_project_13739/

Innovating for social development

IDEAS FOR CHANGE:Paul Basil, CEO of Villgro Innovative Foundation, interacting with students at the Young Innovator programme at IIT-Madras.

The success of Grameen Bank in Bangladesh heralded the social entrepreneurship movement. That revolutionary micro-credit system kept poverty out of villages to some extent to catch the imagination of the world. The concept is gaining popularity and momentum in India as the younger generation is keen on the idea and inclusive model. 

Social entrepreneurship has captured the attention of many inspired and service-minded youth and with the space for innovation growing by the day, youth are supported and encouraged to bring out their best and rejuvenate rural areas. 

Success depends on the cost-effective models and innovative ideas combined with greater reach. Education Plus caught up with young innovators taking the first steps in social entrepreneurship. Passing out of the nation's prestigious educational institutes, these youngsters are trying to reach out to the commoners. 

Hemant Sahal, a biotechnology engineer, has used his technical expertise to come up with a simple strip to indicate the level of water pollution in villages, thousands of which have no access to safe drinking water. Initially, he demonstrated a simple water purification treatment process to be used in villages. And he was selected for the Ashoka Youth Venture. He decided to become a social entrepreneur and bring about a transformation in his own way. Improving on his innovation, he has come up with a water pollution indication strip. The strip when put inside water will indicate the level of pollution (heavy metals only).

Shreya Mishra and Neeraj Jain of IIT-Bombay teamed up with Saurav Poddar of IIT-Kanpur to come up with an innovative education model that has potential to address teacher shortage in primary schools. This core team selected 10 elite schools in Bhopal. Children from Class VII to IX of these city schools would visit 10 anganwadis and interact with and mentor the underprivileged children there. “This pilot project of ours was immensely successful. The department of women and child development provided support and encouragement to our initiative,” says Shreya Mishra. The children from the elite schools worked closely with the anganwadis they visited and came up with academic teaching solutions and teaching tools. A medical bank was also set up in the aanganwadis.

A. Suryanarayanan and Balakrishnan Ramnath of Hindustan College of Engineering, Coimbatore, worked together to innovate a portable water purifier. The objective is to provide employment opportunity to uneducated rural youth and enable them to become entrepreneurs. “Granular-activated Carbon is used by trekkers to treat water that is available to them. We have used this basic principle to design our product,” says Suryanarayana. The product purifies water in a three-step process. Water passes through GAC, and then filtered in micro fibre and finally undergoes a UV treatment process. The equipment can be fixed to any type of tap and water can be filled in bottles. “The market for our product is good. We are yet to make a prototype as we are awaiting funds. Portable water purifier is easily marketable too,” says Suryanarayana. The model can be assembled and marketed by unemployed youth and also they can bottle the water and sell it in cities.

Social entrepreneurship has proved to be an inspiring and telling experience for these young engineers. “Today as a young social entrepreneur, my perspective about social development has changed. Achieving behavioural change and empowering the rural people with a sense of responsibility will surely contribute to nation-building,” says Sahal.

The young social entrepreneurs were at the IIT-Madras to attend a capacity-building workshop organised by Villgro Innovations Foundations. “We concentrate in areas such as agriculture, water, energy and dairy. Our aim is to incubate innovations that could be translated to market-based models thus impacting thousands of lives,” says Siddharth Venkatraman of Villgro.

Identifying students with the right frame of mind and commitment to serve the nation, incubation, providing necessary skills, and other resources to take the innovations to market place are key to the success of social entrepreneurship movement in the country. Paul Basil, chief executive office of Villgro, says that when it comes to social entrepreneurship, the product development has to be affordable.

Sustained social change could be a reality when individuals respond and effectively contribute to bring about a social change. Young innovators are capable of ushering in this change. “If social entrepreneurs come together, they can grow into a national movement and address the most pressing issues of the nation,” says Shreya.

source:http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/03/21/stories/2011032150010100.htm

Environment ministry rejects proposal for IIT in Indore

New Delhi: A proposal for the setting up of anIndian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Indore has been put on hold by the Ministry of Environment and Forests for the time being.

Indore currently is also home to an Indian Institute of Management (IIM).

The government of Madhya Pradesh had sought permission from the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) of the environment ministry for acquiring 80 hectares of forestland for the establishment of the proposed IIT. 

The proposed IIT had been sanctioned to the state of Madhya Pradesh by the Human Resource Development ministry in the eleventh five year plan.

The approval of the government under the Forest Conservation Act is required for the diversion of forestland for any purpose, except for one hectare of forestland for the construction of building that are of public importance such as schools, hospitals, community halls and dispensaries.

The proposal for acquiring the land for the IIT in Indore was rejected by the FAC as it said that the diversion of too much of forestland will damage the ecological balance in and around the area of Indore. 

Had the proposal been accepted by the environment ministry, Indore would have acquired the distinction of being the only city in India to have both an IIM as well as an IIT.

The FAC stated in its report that the proposal for diverting the forestland situated in the vicinity of an important city for the establishment of a non-specific project such as an IIT without taking up a detailed exercise for examining all feasible alternatives would be rejected.

The proposal would have meant the cutting down of around 7,164 trees in the forestland that has a density of 89.55 trees per hectare. An official informed that the area where the proposed IIT would have been set up is a reserved forest land of good quality and there is not much good forestland around Indore.

Another reason for the proposal being rejected was that the committee found that the land in Hasalpur village that was indicated in the proposal for compensatory afforestation was found to be not suitable for raise plantation and no alternative land for afforestation had been mentioned in the proposal.

source:http://indiaedunews.net/IIT/Environment_ministry_rejects_proposal_for_IIT_in_Indore_13575/

Huge demand for skilled professionals in IT industry

Many options: IT industry is heavily dependent on the analytical skills of its workforce.

Unlike most other fields, IT sector is human resource-intensive. The skills of its human resources – software professionals – are critical in keeping the sector running.

IT industry is heavily dependent on the analytical skills of its workforce unlike other sectors such as heavy industries, banking etc., where there is considerable scope for automation of major chunk of the operations at the cost of manpower.

As such, there is a huge demand from the IT industry for skilled professionals well-versed with software. But with a range of courses in demand in the job market, there exists some confusion in the minds of budding software professionals on which domain they should opt for.

To help clear the air, here is some fodder on some of the courses in the job market and what one could expect from them.

Solaris, a Sun Microsystems product now acquired by Oracle is an operating system, a close variant of Unix.

This is pretty popular as a programming environment and also as a server system. Although entry level trainings are there, this is more of an advanced topic, says Puran B. Kalapala, an IIT graduate working with a city-based start-up.

Microsoft SharePoint is a family of software products developed by Microsoft for collaboration, file sharing and web publishing. It is pretty popular in the job market nowadays due to the increasing need for common collaboration portals across teams or requirements distributed across geographical locations. As a course, you will get handsome jobs in good companies, as only good companies can afford to buy Enterprise products from Microsoft, reasons Mr. Puran.

ABAP (Advanced Business Application Programming), a high-level programming language (panic not, high level means an advanced language easy for humans) created by SAP has been around for quite sometime. It is mainly used for programming the SAP-Application Server.

SAP is divided into four distinct modules covering typical functions in an organization – HR (Human Resources) Financials and Controlling (FICO), Materials Management (MM) and Sales and Distribution (SD). “In the SAP world ABAP is unavoidable, and for enterprise level systems, SAP is unavoidable,” points out Mr. Puran, “which means, ABAP professionals will be in considerable demand in the market.”

Common Business Oriented Language (Cobol) is one of the most oft-heard software in the market today. But it is pretty much out of favour among the masses except for in IBM where they have legacy systems called Mainframes. “These huge computers (Mainframes) are still in use because of the heavy dependence of large and typically old industries on them, banking institutions and financial giants for example,” says Mr. Puran. “The cost of shifting to newer technologies is way too high when compared to maintaining those old computers, so they stay.”

Job Control Language (JCL) is a scripting language, part of the Mainframes Operating systems. It is used for controlling large batch processes like calculating interests on all savings accounts in a bank. A scripting language is comprised of scripts or pieces of code which do not need to be compiled, and can be put into an already running system and they start running as if it is any other program. Typically programs need to be compiled before they can be run, not so with scripts.

Another of the legacy systems that continues to be in some demand is Customer Information Control System (CICS), part of the four-part IBM Mainframe software. “This is a 'transaction server' and is mainly used to control the database transactions that take place in an IBM Mainframe Operating System.”

DB2 is a flavour of Database. Learning DB2 means learning how to create, manipulate and maintain databases, just like any of the other databases, says Mr. Puran, senior software engineer with Asymptopica Pvt. Ltd. There are many databases in existence like Oracle DB, Microsoft SQLServer, POSTGRE SQL and DB2, and our existence depends on these databases.

DB2 was initially a part of the IBM mainframes system, but now DB2 has moved on and is one of the five most used databases in the world. They can now be used on Windows or Linux systems and so there is a good demand for DB2 administrators or programmers in the market.

source:http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/02/21/stories/2011022150540100.htm

IIT-Kharagpur to accept LSAT scores

In a move which could open the doors for aspiring law students from India and abroad to its campus, IIT-Kharagpur has decided to acceptLaw School Admission Test (LSAT) scores for admission to its 3 year LLB Programme in Intellectual Property Laws.

Disclosing the development, a senior faculty of the IIT's law school said, LSAT-India is administered by Pearson VUE, the global leader in assessments and testing. LSAT-India provides a standard measure of acquired reading and analytical and logical reasoning skills that law schools can use as one of several factors in assessing applicants.

LSAT-India is a standardised test designed for admission to Indian law school by the Law School Admission Council (LSAC), USA, which also administers the LSAT-global used by leading lawschools worldwide.

This is the first time that IIT Kharagpur has given recognition to LSAT and now it has the unique distinction of being the only law school in any IIT in India.

IIT Kharagpur's Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law (RGSOIPL) has been set up in collaboration with the George Washington University Law School.

Candidates from India and abroad with LSAT-India or LSAT-global scores are qalso will be eligible to apply for the programme.

source:http://www.indiaedunews.net/Delhi/IIT-Kharagpur_to_accept_LSAT_scores_13526/

(NEWS) 9,600 IIT Seats 5.3 Lakh Aspirants In 2011 Session

This year, the total number of applicants for the joint entrance exam (JEE), have gone up by 5,000 as compared to last year, to get the most coveted seat in the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) from Mumbai zone.

While number of applicants from Mumbai is almost the same, there is a substantial growth in the number of applicants from tier-II cities like Nagpur and Jaipur this year, which also falls in the Mumbai zone.

The total numbers of applicants across the country has gone up from over 4.5 lakh to 5.3 lakh this year. Over 5.3 lakh candidates across the country would be vying for 9,600 seats in IITs.

From the Mumbai zone itself, which also has the highest numbers of applicants from the seven zones, 85,169 students have applied for the IIT-JEE. Students from Maharashtra, Goa, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Belgaum from Karnataka also apply from the Mumbai zone.

According to the chairman of IIT-JEE from IIT-Bombay, Abhijeet Chatterjee, candidates from tier-II cities contribute the most to the increase in numbers.

IIT-Bombay to consider proposal for setting up NY centre seriously

Mumbai: The Indian Institute of Technology - Bombay (IIT-B) has been invited by the New YorkCity Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) to submit a proposal for setting up a campus in the Big Apple for courses in applied science.

The tie up with IIT-B will allow the city to have a world class facility for applied sciences teaching and research along with an emphasis on applied engineering.

The proposal from IIT-B is being prepared by a committee at the institute and will be submitted by April 2011. The capital contribution will be made by the host city along with provision of land and other considerations for setting up the campus.

IIT-B Director Devang Khakhar who had been invited by the NYDEC to consider setting up the campus said that they were exploring the concept and a team was working on a feasible plan.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, commenting on the need for setting up the campus for applied science courses said that the city needed to optimize its business strengths. He said that the city was committed to finding the right partner for the applied sciences center and would also provide the support needed for setting up such a campus.

"The city will be providing all the support that will be needed for establishing such a facility because research in the fields of engineering, science and technology is creating the next generation of innovations in global business and this is what will be driving the economy forward," Bloomberg stated.

He further added that the city of New York already had all ingredients that would help in establishing the applied science and engineering center. These included a highly educated global population, unequalled financial and business community that would contribute in the capital and support for new ventures as well as existing top notch institutions that had their own latest researches. He said that these strengths could be capitalized upon for the new centre.

source:http://www.indiaedunews.net/IIT/IIT-Bombay_to_consider_proposal_for_setting_up_NY_centre_seriously_13481/

India's best students who became CEOs

NARAYAN MURTHY

As a boy, Nagavara Ramarao Narayana Murthy was someone who could easily go unnoticed in a crowd. He was short, but sharp. Often, his seniors in school came to him for solving Science problems.

Murthy came from a lower middle class, Brahmin family from Mysore. His father, a school teacher, was fond of English literature. And like all the boys of his class, he too had dreams of going to IIT. So he worked hard, studied in the shade of boulders close to Chamundi hills, and helped many in his class to prepare for the entrance exam.

Murthy wasn’t surprised when he got through. When he broke the news of his success to his father, it is said his words were: ‘Anna, I have passed the exam…I want to join IIT.” Proud he was of his son’s achievement but he couldn’t afford the fees and so Murthy had to relinquish his IIT dreams. Murthy stayed back in Mysore. When asked about his decision to stay back, he said to his friends, "It is not the institution but you alone who can change your life with hard work".

He lived up to his own words. Several years afterwards, Narayana Murthy revolutionised India’s software industry by founding Infosys. And this has made him the icon of middle class dreams. He redefined India in the eyes world. India was no longer a third world country, but a fast developing nation. In the process, he promoted thousands of young, creative Indian minds to the world and made Infosys and India a hub of talent.

It is known to the world that he founded Infosys along with six others with just a few thousand rupees which his wife, Sudha Murthy gave. It was an incredible risk to take, but Murthy knew it was going to work, just as he knew he would get through IIT. Which he did, eventually. After Murthy graduated from the National Institute of Engineering, Mysore, he joined IIT, Kanpur.

Thanks to IT and its development, the little known romance of Murthy and Sudha Kulkarni is talked about everywhere. It is hard to believe reading from Sudha’s account of an introvert, quiet Murthy, that he is the same person to have revolutionised the IT industry.

When Murthy was asked by Sudha’s father about his ambitions, he said he wanted to become a politician in the communist party and wanted to open an orphanage.

While he has opened several orphanages since, his dream of becoming a politician still remains unfulfilled. After retiring from Infosys, Murthy was hoping to become President of India after the term of Dr. Abdul Kalam. Even though he denied having political ambitions, his supporters would like to see him on the throne.

Our Mysore Murthy is, no doubt, a visionary who has ignited millions of young minds.

Education

B E (1967)

MTech (1969)

Honours and Awards

Padma Vibushan- 2008

Officer of the Legion of Honor- 2008

World Entrepreneur of the Year- 2003

Business India’s “Businessman of the Year- 1999

JRD Tata Corporate Leadership Award- 1996-97

INDRA NOOYI

Chairman & CEO, PepsiCo

Chairman of PepsiCo's Board of Directors, Indra is the highest-ranking Indian-born woman in corporate America, and she attributes much of her success to her upbringing in India. "Being a woman and being foreign-born, you've got to be smarter than anyone else," says Nooyi, who often dons a sari at PepsiCo events.

Education

She completed schooling at Holy Angels AIHSS, Chennai, has a BSc (Chemistry) from Madras Christian College in 1974 and a PGDM from IIM Calcutta. In 1978, Nooyi earned a Master's degree in Public and Private Management from Yale School of Management. At Yale, she worked as a receptionist from midnight to 5 a.m. to earn some money.

Career graph

Starting her career in India, Nooyi held different positions at Johnson & Johnson and textile firm Mettur Beardsell. In the US, Nooyi worked with BCG, Motorola and ABB. Nooyi joined PepsiCo in 1994, and became chairperson in 2007.

Childhood memories

As a child, Indra’s grandfather insisted on academic excellence from his grandchildren. According to Indra, when she did not figure in the top three ranks in class, she preferred to throw herself under a bus than face her grandfather.

Awards

2007, Padma Bhushan

2008 Elected as Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences

ARUN SARIN

Former CEO, Vodafone

Born on October 21, 1954 at Panchmari, Madhya Pradesh, Sarin was an academically bright student. He was equally good at sports like field hockey, boxing and various extracurricular activities. He wanted to follow his father's footsteps into the military by pursuing a career as a pilot, but when his mom protested, he applied and was accepted at IIT, Kharagpur.

He graduated from the IIT in 1975 with a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering in the top 10 percent of his class and received the BC Roy gold medal for academic excellence. He received a full scholarship to the University of California, Berkeley, Graduate College of Engineering.

In the year 2003, Sarin became the Chief Executive Officer of Vodafone. When he resigned in 2008 from his post Vodafone was the world's largest mobile phone company by revenue. It was the firm’s large market presence in India that catapulted Sarin into the limelight. Currently he serves on the boards of Cisco and Safeway, Inc.

Academics

BTech (IIT)

MBA (Haas UC,Berkeley)

Awards

University of California at Berkeley, Haas School Business Leader of Year- 2002

University of California Trust (UK) Award- 2003

Born in Nagpur, Pandit was the Citigroup’s youngest CEO when he took over in 2007. The first Indian to achieve this feat, the job was touted as the toughest in the world due to the company’s poor performance.

A brilliant boy in school, he moved to US when he was 16. After finishing his Master’s in electrical engineering and MBA from Columbia University, he was determined to get a PhD in a different subject. In those days, students preferred to either study medicine or engineering. And that was the time when his guide advised him to take up finance, as it was a good field. He followed the advice, and switched to finance.

For a brief span, he taught at Indiana University Bloomington, Columbia’s Business School. He stepped into the corporate world in 1994, as a head of Morgan Stanley. His administrative and technical skills, plus an ability to make himself indispensable to bosses like John J. Mack and Phillip J. Purcell, fuelled his career at Morgan Stanley, where he became the president. He dealt with the Institutional Securities Division, Worldwide Institutional Equities Division. For him, this was an interesting area to work on

“To do well you have to put a lot of yourself into it.”

BS, Electrical Engineering, Columbia University (1976)

MS, Columbia University (1977)

MBA, Columbia Business School, Columbia University (1980)

PhD, Columbia Business School, Columbia University (1986)

SABEER BHATIA

Pioneer of web-based e-mail

Sabeer Bhatia has done the unconventional ever since he decided to study abroad at the age of 19; two years into undergraduate education at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, he qualified for a transfer scholarship at Caltech, considered to be the world's most competitive scholarship. After graduating from Caltech in 1989, he pursued an MS in Electrical Engineering at Stanford University.

At the age of 27, Bhatia was no longer interested in working for others, and together with Smith, began chasing what many people in Silicon Valley deemed a “crazy idea” – a free e-mail service. They raised about $300,000 for their venture - Hotmail. Within a year, Hotmail had one million subscribers. So revolutionary was it that Microsoft bought it for $400 million after 18 months.

Did you know?

* He was rejected by 20 venture capitalists before Draper Fisher Juvetson bought his idea.

* The original spelling was HoTMaiL

Award

TR100 by the MIT, given to 100 young innovators who are expected to have the greatest impact on technology.

Qualifications

BTech, BITS Pilani

BSc(Honours) California Institute of Technology, US

MS Electrical Engineering (Stanford)

source : http://in.education.yahoo.com/news/yeducareers360/indias-best-students-who-became-ceos-20110201

MMST programme under IIT,kharagpur

The School of Medical Science and Technology under the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, has invited applications for admission to the three-year Masters in Medical Science and Technology (MMST) programme. MBBS degree holders with 55 per cent marks in aggregate who have studied mathematics at the Plus Two level may apply. Applicants should have aptitude for interdisciplinary medical research and application of technology in medicine. All admitted students are eligible for an assistantship of Rs.15,000 a month. Apply online from February 1 to March 4 on http://gate.iitkgp.ac.in/mmst.

source: http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/02/01/stories/2011020150070200.htm