Transtech 16
Tolani Maritime Institute (TMI)- in association with the Institute of Engineers (India) and the Institute of Marine Engineers (India) Pune Branch- organised its 9th three-day all India seminar: “TRANSTECH’ 16.” Held between March 3 and 5, the event focused on the theme: “Environmental aspects of coastal and inland waterways”.
Capt BK Saxena, Principal, Tolani Maritime Institute (TMI), welcomed the delegates. “Transtech is a good opportunity for engineering students from other institutes to interact with TMI students,” he said.
“Inland waterways are an excellent and cheap mode of transport, but their development will have a great impact on the marine environment,” said Prof Dr RV Saraf, Convenor- Environmental Engineering Division, Maharashtra. He pointed out that even mangroves were in decline all over the world because of development. He, however, applauded the new Union budget for focusing more on the development of rural coastal and inland waterways.
Chief Guest Dr SB Agnihotri, IAS (Retd), former Additional Secretary, Govt of India and lecturer at IIT Bombay, congratulated TMI for focusing on the theme. “Transportation through water is an age old tradition in India and the current government has given a boost to this, but we have to make sure that we walk hand-in-hand with the environment,” he stressed.
Guest of Honour Padmashri Achyut Gokhale- IAS (Retd) former Secretary, Govt of India Non Conv Energy, Ex Chief Secretary North East- shared his experiences from the time when has was the project in-charge of cleaning the Ganga. He said, “I was horrified to see the pollution levels in the Ganga”. He advised young engineers not to contribute to increasing pollution, as pollution generated on land adversely affects the oceans.
“It is our responsibility to see that we do not destroy ourselves with our own man-made pollution,” he added.
Transtech hosted several speeches from top dignitaries on the first day of the fest this year. The event was well coordinated by Capt SV Subhedar, Past President, Indian Coastal Conference Shipping Association.
Capt Inderveer Solanki, Senior Consultant to the Inland Waterway Authority of India (IWAI) and Vice President, ARI, spoke on “Inland Water Transport”.
Cadet Vishal Nijhawan, one of the organisers of the event, proudly revealed that Transtech was one of the biggest technical fests in the country and marine students from all over India came to TMI to participate. “This is one platform where we can showcase our talent; even first-year students come up with their own models” added Cadet Rakshit.
Cadet Subham Singhal, who was well-appreciated by many speakers for his video on Transtech, said, “Tolani provides us with good facilities to showcase our talent in the fest and win prizes on behalf of our institute”.
A total of 22 papers were received and 12 were selected for presentation from six colleges; in addition, as many as nine models were on display. A team of three judges selected the winners of awards sponsored by TMI and the Institute of Marine Engineers (India), Pune branch.
The prize winners:
Papers:
First prize won by Cadet Aadesh J Srivastava and Akshat Gupta from Tolani Maritime Institute,
Second Prize was shared by Cadets Shubham Saurabh, Karan Upadhayay and Arpit Jajoo from Indian Maritime University (IMU), Chennai; and Rajeev Metta and Gaurav Singh from TMI on “Airborne Wind turbines”
Models:
1st Prize:
Cadets Divyanshu Kushwaha, Gurpreet Singh and Abhikant Bhambi from TMI.
2nd Prize: Joint winners:
Cadets Mohit Sharma, Ankit Kumar Singh and Mrinal Banerjee from TMI.
Cadets Shaun Bruno Fernandes, Vinay Kumar Muttineni, Biswa Ranjan Ghoshal and Mandeep Singh Chawla from TMI.
3rd Prize: Joint winners:
Cadets Daneesh David, Bennet D Costa, Suju Raj and Akhil Dev Anil from Eurotech Maritime Academy, Kochi.
Cadets Krishnabhan Singh, Abhishek Soni, Shubham Singhal and Fatwani Hemant from TMI.
Special Prize:
Cadet Rishab Jangra from TMI.