Kurukshetra (festival)
Type | Student-run, non-profit |
---|---|
Founded | 2007 |
Place | Chennai, India |
Institute | College of Engineering, Guindy |
Major events | Online programming contest, business planning, general quiz, Cerebra, XCEED, Riddles of Sphinx |
Prize money | 1 Million INR |
Website |
kurukshetra |
Kurukshetra is an international techno-management festival conducted annually by the College of Engineering, Guindy, in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. It is a four-day festival organized by the college's CEG Tech Forum. The festival is been named after Kurukshetra, the battlefield of the apocalyptic war of survival between the Kauravas and Pandavas in the great Indian epic of Mahabharata. The tag-line of the fest 'The Battle of Brains' refers to the battle. It was first held in 2007[1] and is the first techno-management festival in India to be awarded UNESCO patronage. Its logo, the Cyclotron, symbolizes the celebration of the indomitable spirit of engineering and innovation.
Guest Lectures
The Kurukshetra Guest Lecture Series aims at bringing the finest confluence of people who have dared to touch the pinnacle of success. They will be eminent scholars who have been pioneers in their chosen field of study, business moguls who have revolutionized the industry with their ingenuity and experts from various spheres of activity such as sport and arts. Some notable personalities who delivered lectures at recent editions of Kurukshetra.
- AbhasMitra: Former head of theoretical astrophysics at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre(BARC)
- Angelo Vermeulen: Crew commander of a MARS Simulation program funded by NASA
- Arjun Shetty: CEO & Co-Founder of BankBazaar
- Chiragh Dewan &HimanshuVaishnav: Founders of Airocorp
- Dr.Seshagiri Rao: Associate Director at Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO)
- Girish Mathrubootham: CEO, Freshdesk
- Hemanth Kumar Guruswamy: CEO, Airtel Broadband
- Masha Nazeem: Inventor. Talk about how fun science can be and the different opportunities available.
- Ashok Krish: Head of Social Media and Workplace Re-imagination Practice, TCS
- Muruganantham: Inventor of low-cost sanitary napkin making machine
- S.Somasegar: Corporate Vice-President of the Developer Division, Microsoft, USA
- V.Ponraj: Scientist - DRDO and Scientific Advisor to Dr. Abdul Kalam
- Dr.Adimurthy: Senior Advisor (interplanetary Missions) at the Indian Space Research Organisation
- Dan Burns :Physicist and Faculty Scholar at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
- Leonardo Chiariglione: Chairman and co-founded the Moving Pictures Experts Group(MPEG)
- Mr.AnandSampathraman: Head of Plant and Enterprise Sustainability Solutions Engineering & Industrial Services, TCS and is consulting for Sustainable Manufacturing in Industry
- Praveen Vettiyattil: Director - Renewable Energy at Industrial Engineering and General Contracting (IEGC) in UAE.CEO & Serial Innovator - SHARADA SOLUTIONS, Director - Renewable Energy
- Dr. K. Sivan: Project director- GSLV
- Kumar Rangarajan: Founder & Chief-Little Eye Labs
- Suneet Singh Tuli: Founder and CEO of Datawind Ltd.
- Dr.Smitha Rao: Working as Faculty associate-Research at UT Arlington since 2012
- Dr. Archana Sharma: Only Indian scientist who has been involved in the Higgs Boson experiment
- Guido Tonelli: Italian particle physicist and CERN scientist
- Anousheh Ansari: First female private space explorer and also the first space ambassador
- Shanker Annaswamy: Senior Advisor – India Enterprise, IBM India/ South Asia (ISA)
- Pulkit Gaur: Popular academic innovators of India
- Shiva Ayyadurai: Man who invented the E-mail at the age of 14.
- Stephen Wolfram: Chief designer of Mathematica, the author of “A New Kind of Science”, the creator of Wolfram Alpha answer engine, and the founder and CEO of WolframResearch
- Daniel Kish: The Blind Man Who Taught Himself To See
- Rajalakshmi Subramanian: Senior Director with Groupon
- Osamu Hasegawa: Japanese researcher in the fields of computer science and robotics at Tokyo Institute of Technology
Exhibitions
Exhibitions are an integral part of kurukshetra showcasing technological breakthroughs and paradigm shifts that the human civilization has encountered so far and the surprises that future holds in store for us. K!arnival, K’s exotic exhibition, opens the gateway to the awesomeness of science, technology, arts, history and culture. Over the years, varieties of exhibits have been held glorifying different domains. Some of the remarkable past exhibits are: Apache road show, Space Trek Mobile Planetarium and 3D floor painting held in 2014; Arjuna Battle Tank Demo, Ancient Coin Show, AeroModelling Show and Lasertag gaming in 2015; and Caricature Workshop, Photography Workshop, Rubik’s cube Workshop and Virtual Reality Exhibition held in 2016.
Workshops
The workshops range all over the radar of technology from aero-modelling, and robotics to motorcycles. The hands on experience, expert guidance and innovative learning environment provided by these workshops. Some of the notable workshops in the previous and the upcoming editions are:
General | Wildlife Photography, Air Crash Investigation
Audio Engineering, 3D printing, Journalism, Digital freeze, K!rack it |
Engineering | Dynamic Design, Ethical Hacking, Rocketry, Energy Scavenging, Green Computing, HTML5, Know Your Grid
NoSQL, Printed Electronics`, Rammed Earth Construction, Nuclear Power Generation, Sustainability Solutions,Wearable Electronics, IBM's Security Intelligence with Penetration testing , Reverse Engineering, Biomimicry |
Robotics | Mobile Robotics, SCARA(Selective Compliance Assembly Robot Arm) Echo - Speech Control Robot, Autonomous Mobile Plotter Robot, Face gesture controlled robot, Bluetooth controlled bots, Brainwave-controlled Robots, Eye-controlled robots. |
Management | Thats how you talk, Personal Branding & Networking, Spirit of Entrepreneurship, Venture capitalism,Growth hacking |
School | Krithi ,an exclucive workshop, which will spot the finest aspirants of innovation at the school level. Every year students are given a great experience of science or new technology in a fun filled and interactive manner. |
Xceed
Xceed,[2] the nation-wide robotics, coding and quizzing championship, is a precursor to Kurukshetra. It serves as a platform to bring the smart brains from across the country to participate in Kurukshetra. Xceed is usually conducted at various institutions between 30 and 60 days before Kurukshetra. The winners of the xceed events conducted elsewhere are given a direct chance to participate in the Grand Finale of the same event conducted at Kuruskehtra. On 2016, xceed[3] was conducted in Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Bangalore.
Social Initiative
E-for-Educate[4] is an e-waste drive with an altruistic twist. On an average, 50 million tonnes of e-wastes are generated every year and this rate increases at a very alarming phase. It is not that we have no idea about e-wastes and its hazards on nature but the fact is that we don’t find time for responsive handling of wastes in our ever – busy schedules.
Another important issue is on where India stands in the human development index (HDI). There are about 287 million people in India who cannot read. Going to a school, growing in the guidance of a teacher and learning is a dream of millions across India.
E for Educate addresses both the concerns very effectively. This drive converts the potential destruction into stepping–stones for underprivileged children.
The goals of the initiative are:
- To create awareness to school students about e-waste and also its hazardous effects on nature and also to collect e-wastes from general public through students.
- To recycle the wastes collected and to utilise the funds that are raised for the education of under privileged by joining hands with” BHUMI “, a Non – Governmental Organisation.
Projects
Some of the innovative projects displayed in K! 16[5][6] are:
1. Surveillance bot- A Bluetooth controlled, portable surveillance system
2. Wireless Accident Detection System- An immediate response sensor system capable of sending a S.O.S notifying family members.
3. Swacch bot- A Bluetooth controlled, portable environment tidying bot.
4. Pick your ground- A Land selection web app that is embedded with different layers of maps to provide data about the nearby features such as schools, bus stops, railways station as well as soil maps, ground water prospects.
5. Air lock- An Infrared sensor lock capable of detecting the motion and proximity of the finger to unlock the door.
Working committee: CTF| CEG Tech Forum
Founded in 2006, CEG Tech Forum is the technical hub of College of Engineering, Guindy. A completely student run organisation, its goal is to nurture, motivate and guide the budding technologists and scientists present within the walls of CEG, apart from organizing events and encouraging projects. Through collaborations with industries and academia, the technological and research curiosity in the students is brought out. The hub is the pillar of Kurukshetra. It organizes and conducts K annually.
Sponsors
- Twenty19
- Accenture
- Airtel
- Ameex
- Aricent
- Bosch
- Canara Bank
- Caterpillar
- Codechef
- Cisco
- Contact Singapore
- Cognizant
- Danfoss
- Dell Fidelity
- Frugal Labs
- Groupon
- Global Scholar
- Hexaware
- The Hindu
- HeyMath
- HP !
- HackerRank
- !i3indya
- !IBM
- ICICI
- IIP
- Imageskart !
- PNGBC
- Infosys
- Intel
- Indian Oil
- KTH
- KVB
- Ashok Leyland
- LI2 Innovations
- Line
- Linkstreet
- LT Lucas
- TVS
- Michelin
- Microsoft
- Monster
References
- ↑ Malarvizhi, J. (2007-01-05). "A racy start to `Kurukshetra 07'". The Hindu.
- ↑ Srinivasan, Meera (2012-02-03). "Robots' war named 'Kurukshetra'". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2016-11-27.
- ↑ "XCEED".
- ↑ "Kurukshetra 2016: Battle of the brains". The Hindu. 2016-02-14. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2016-11-27.
- ↑ Venugopal, Vasudha (2011-02-06). "Projects galore at Kurukshetra". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2016-11-27.
- ↑ "projects".
- ↑ Team, CTF Tech. "Kurukshetra'17". www.kurukshetra.org.in. Retrieved 2016-11-27.