Civil engineering ― Well poised for growth

摘要

Recently, an inter-collegiate technical paper competition for the civil engineering students from the seven colleges in Mumbai and Navi Mumbai was organised. The students were given two interesting themes: (ⅰ) Is civil engineering a dying profession? and (ⅱ) Impact of information technology in the field of civil engineering. More than 100 students participated in the competition and 34 papers were received. The initial screening was conducted by eminent faculty members namely, Dr G. Venkatachalam, head, civil engineering department, IIT Bombay, Prof Tanuja Bandivadekar, head, civil engineering department, Rizvi College of Engineering and Dr (Mrs) Chakravorty, professor, department of structural engineering, VJTI. They shortlisted six papers for presentation, which was held on October 7, 2003 at VJTI, Mumbai, before an enthusiastic gathering of students, teachers and selected invitees from the industry. Students from each team made power-point presentations and also answered a number of questions from the audience. Based on an exhaustive criteria, a three-member panel of judges selected two teams for the awards. The first award was bagged by the VJTI team comprising of Mr Yash Ahuja, Ms Shraddha Venugopal and Mr Nitin Khare. The second prize was won by the team from Rizvi College of Engineering, comprising of Mr Jigar K. Savla and Mr Jay M. Joshi. The judges panel comprised of Mr Satish Dhupetia, a leading consultant, Prof S. Sundaram, ex-principal, VJTI and Mr V.R. Kulkarni, editor, ICJ. The competition was organised by the Associated Cement Cos. Ltd, Mumbai, ably supported by Mr S. Shankar, vice-president, marketing, ACC, Mr Vikas Damle, deputy manager, ACC and others.