NATIONAL SCIENCE DAY was celebrated in KLN College of Informational Technology on 10 Mar. 11', Thursday.
I yr. students participated in it and presented papers on various subjects which includes Chemistry, English & Physics. INDU R & MARIA ZENO SINGH S (IT) got I prize in Physics, and UVASRI M & RAMYA G (CIVIL & EEE) secured II prize in Chemistry. Also our appreciation extends to HARISH R & NAVEEN KUMAR S, MADHAN GOPI S & SAMUEL RAJASEKAR N (MECH), who presented papers in English and PRASANNA B (ECE) for his paper in Chemistry.
We congratulate them for their efforts & wish them many success in days to come!
Around 19 million low-birth weight babies are born every year in developing countries. Unable to regulate their body temperatures, many die. The Embrace helps to warm vulnerable infants (a special pouch slips into the back of the bag to provide hours of safe heat) while allowing for nursing and cuddling.
Developed by Jane Chen, Linus Liang, Naganand Murthy, Rahul Panicker
Website www.embraceglobal.org
Launch Country : India
The product is in the final stages of product development. It is going to be pilot launched in India and then rolled out to other developing nation.
Source : National Gegraphic Magazine, Nov 2010, Big Ideas Little Packages
1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period this time around.
2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a fulltime informal school called life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.
3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial and error, experimentation. The "failed" experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately "works."
4. A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on to the next lesson.
5. Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive there are lessons to be learned.
6. "There" is no better than "here." When your "there" has become a "here" you will simply obtain another "there" that will again look better than "here."
7. Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.
8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
9. Your answers lie inside you. The answer to life's questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
10. This will often be forgotten, only to be remembered again.
(Cherie Carter-Scott)
Congratulations to our BRAINTEASER's participants!!
TOM CYRIAC PAUL& MADHAN GOPI S(I Mech.); RAVI KUMAR R & VIGNESH SHARMA K (I Cse.); SYED ALI M&LINGAMUTHU S (I Civil); LAKSHMI NARAYANAN S & SATHASIVAM S (I Mech. & I Civil) took part in an Inter-collegiate Quiz Competition for UG students at EBET Group of Institutions on 24th February 2011. Out of 50 colleges that participated in this event, Vickram College of Engineering banged the 7th place & was offered with certificates. The competetors on this event said: it was a new thrill and it gave them an opportunity to compete amongst the best colleges in the city. Also that this has given them a new exposure, knowledge & spirit that would carry them to the next level. We take great pleasure in congratulating our students & wish them many more success in the following days. Gud luck guys!! :)
In 2002, Narayanan Krishnan, a gifted young chef from Madurai, India, was a bright, young, award-winning chef with a five-star hotel group, short-listed for an elite job in Switzerland .But a quick family visit home before heading to Europe changed everything. Something he saw shocked him to his core.
“I saw a very old man eating his own human waste for food,” he told CNN.
Krishnan knew he couldn’t go back to the gourmet restaurants he’d been working in when his own countrymen were starving to death. So he decided to stay in India and begin fixing meals for that man, and for the countless others who could not care for themselves.
The following year 2003, he founded the nonprofit group Akshaya Trust. (http://www.akshayatrust.org/) in 2003. Every day, he wakes up at 4 am, cooks a simple hot meal and then, along with his team, loads it in a van and travels about 200 km feeding the homeless in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. He serves Breakfast, lunch and dinner to 400 odd people in Madurai. , and gives them free haircuts and beard trims when they need it. Since 2003, he has served more than 1.2 million meals.
His recipients are nearly all mentally ill, and do not have the capacity to thank him. Nonetheless, Krishnan receives great pleasure from the work he does.
“I get this energy from the people,” he said. “The food which I cook ... the enjoyment which they get is the energy. I see the soul. I want to save my people.”
Throughout the year, CNN profiles inspiring individuals around the world for their CNN Heroes series. Now, the news channel has announced the top 10 "heroes" of 2010and Krishnan has been selected to this list of CNN's Top 10 heroes of 2010. He is the only Indian in a list of 10 heroes that CNN has picked worldwide to honour. One of them will be chosen CNN Hero of the Year, selected by the public through an online poll. Anyone can vote him till 18th, November 2010. Counting the votes will be on 20th, November this year. The results will be announced on 25th November, 2010 on the Thanksgiving Day. This event will be a live telecast on CNN worldwide.
To see his story..
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/04/01/cnnheroes.krishnan.hunger/
5S is the name of a workplace organization methodology that uses a list of five Japanese words which are seiri, seiton, seiso, seiketsu and shitsuke. Transliterated or translated into English, they all start with the letter "S". The list describes how items are stored and how the new order is maintained. The decision-making process usually comes from a dialogue about standardization which builds a clear understanding among employees of how work should be done. It also instills ownership of the process in each employee.
The 5S's - an English "translation"
1. Seiri : Sort: Clearing the work area 2. Seiton: Set in Order: Designating locations
3. Seiso: Shine: Cleanliness & workplace appearance
4. Seiketsu: Standardize: Everyone doing things the same way
5. Shitsuke: Sustain: Ingraining the 5S's into the culture
The 5S's lead to improved processes and ultimately:
Reduced set-up times
Reduced cycle times
Increased floor space
Lower safety incident/accident rate
Less wasted labor
Better equipment reliability
Sort: Clearing the work area Any work area should only have the items needed to perform the work in the area. All other items should be cleared (sorted out) from the work area.
Set in Order: Designating locations
Everything in the work area should have a place and everything should be in its place.
Shine: Cleanliness & workplace appearance
Not only should the work area be clear, it should also be clean. Cleanliness involves housekeeping efforts, improving the appearance of the work area, and even more importantly, preventive housekeeping - keeping the work area from getting dirty, rather than just cleaning it up after it becomes dirty.
Standardize: Everyone doing things the same way Everyone in the work area and in the organization must be involved in the 5S effort, creating best practices and then getting everyone to "copy" those best practices the same way, everywhere, and every time. Work area layouts and storage techniques should be standardized wherever possible.
Sustain: Ingraining the 5S's into the culture It's tough to keep a 5S effort, or any improvement effort for that matter, going. The 5S's involve a culture change. And to achieve a culture change, it has to be ingrained into the organization - by everyone at all levels in the organization.
Dr. Yoshiro NakaMatsu holds the record for inventions, according to the Guiness Book of World Records, with over 3200 to his credit-three times that of his closest rival, Thomas Edison. Dr Nakamat's inventions include the floppy disk, the CD, the DVD, the digital watch, cinemascope and the taxi cab meter.
The NakaMats method of invention involves diving underwater without an oxygen tank or snorkel and staying below the surface for as long as possible until an idea bubbles up. Upon resurfacing, he then writes down the idea on a dripping-wet Plexiglas tablet. When asked if all that underwater breathing was dangerous to his health, he said yes, but that dying was not part of his research.
NakaMats, doesn’t mind being called eccentric. He is a graduate of the University of Tokyo and completed a doctorate program in engineering. Now seventy-eight years old, NakaMats refers to himself as a middle-aged man, thanks to his theory of longevity.
His most creative time is between midnight and 4 a.m., and then he gets four hours’ sleep. NakaMats believes that if you sleep more than six hours in any twenty-four-hour period, your brainpower decreases. He eats only one meal a day—at dinner—with a maximum of seven hundred calories. He also photographs every dish he eats to recall the stimulating ones.
NakaMats doesn’t drink or smoke, and does daily weight lifting and swimming. He is a big advocate of the twenty-minute power nap in the special Cerebrex chair that he, of course, invented.
NakaMats’s inventive career started at five years old, when he came up with the idea for a landing stabilizer for his model airplane. A few years later he saw his mother struggling to pour kerosene out of a big container, so he devised an automatic pump. His mother was a schoolteacher and encouraged her son to build models of his inventions and then helped him apply for patents.
His biggest success came in 1950 when, as a student at the University of Tokyo, he manufactured the floppy disk. After six of Japan’s leading corporations turned down his request to have them produce the floppy disk, he granted the sales license for the disk to IBM, which now holds the patents for sixteen of his inventions.
While studying or working on his inventions NakaMats usually listened to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony on 78 rpm records. He kept getting distracted by the hissing sounds from dust and popping sounds from scratches on the records. So he realized he must create a higher quality recording device and the CD was born.
There’s a “techie” adage in Asia that the nail that stands up in Asia gets hammered down, while the nail that stands up in Silicon Valley drives a Ferrari and has stock options. Having developed a complete ideation process of freedom, expression, creation, and action, Dr. NakaMats is a nail that keeps standing taller with each new invention.
It was probably the April of 1974. Bangalore was getting warm and gulmohars were blooming at the IISc campus. I was the only girl in my postgraduate department and was staying at the ladies' hostel. Other girls were pursuing research in different departments of Science.
I was looking forward to going abroad to complete a doctorate in computer science. I had been offered scholarships from Universities in the US... I had not thought of taking up a job in India.
One day, while on the way to my hostel from our lecture-hall complex, I saw an advertisement on the notice board. It was a standard job-requirement notice from the famous automobile company Telco (now Tata Motors)... It stated that the company required young, bright engineers, hardworking and with an excellent academic background, etc.
At the bottom was a small line: 'Lady Candidates need not apply.'
I read it and was very upset. For the first time in my life I was up against gender discrimination.
Though I was not keen on taking up the job, I saw it as a challenge. I had done extremely well in academics, better than most of my male peers...
Little did I know then that in real life academic excellence is not enough to be successful?
After reading the notice I went fuming to my room. I decided to inform the topmost person in Telco's management about the injustice the company was perpetrating. I got a postcard and started to write, but there was a problem: I did not know who headed Telco
I thought it must be one of the Tatas. I knew JRD Tata was the head of the Tata Group; I had seen his pictures in newspapers (actually, Sumant Moolgaokar was the company's chairman then) I took the card, addressed it to JRD and started writing. To this day I remember clearly what I wrote.
'The great Tatas have always been pioneers. They are the people who started the basic infrastructure industries in India, such as iron and steel, chemicals, textiles and locomotives they have cared for higher education in India since 1900 and they were responsible for the establishment of the Indian Institute of Science. Fortunately, I study there. But I am surprised how a company such as Telco is discriminating on the basis of gender.'
I posted the letter and forgot about it. Less than 10 days later, I received a telegram stating that I had to appear for an interview at Telco's Pune facility at the company's expense. I was taken aback by the telegram. My hostel mate told me I should use the opportunity to go to Pune free of cost and buy them the famous Pune saris for cheap! I collected Rs30 each from everyone who wanted a sari when I look back, I feel like laughing at the reasons for my going, but back then they seemed good enough to make the trip.
It was my first visit to Pune and I immediately fell in love with the city.
To this day it remains dear to me. I feel as much at home in Pune as I do in Hubli, my hometown. The place changed my life in so many ways. As directed, I went to Telco's Pimpri office for the interview.
There were six people on the panel and I realized then that this was serious business.
'This is the girl who wrote to JRD,' I heard somebody whisper as soon as I entered the room. By then I knew for sure that I would not get the job. The realization abolished all fear from my mind, so I was rather cool while the interview was being conducted.
Even before the interview started, I reckoned the panel was biased, so I told them, rather impolitely, 'I hope this is only a technical interview.'
They were taken aback by my rudeness, and even today I am ashamed about my attitude.
The panel asked me technical questions and I answered all of them.
Then an elderly gentleman with an affectionate voice told me, 'Do you know why we said lady candidates need not apply? The reason is that we have never employed any ladies on the shop floor. This is not a co-ed college; this is a factory. When it comes to academics, you are a first ranker throughout. We appreciate that, but people like you should work in research laboratories.
I was a young girl from small-town Hubli. My world had been a limited place.
I did not know the ways of large corporate houses and their difficulties, so I answered, 'But you must start somewhere, otherwise no woman will ever be able to work in your factories.'
Finally, after a long interview, I was told I had been successful. So this was what the future had in store for me. Never had I thought I would take up a job in Pune. I met a shy young man from Karnataka there, we became good friends and we got married.
It was only after joining Telco that I realized who JRD was: the uncrowned king of Indian industry. Now I was scared, but I did not get to meet him till I was transferred to Bombay. One day I had to show some reports to Mr Moolgaokar, our chairman, who we all knew as SM. I was in his office on the first floor of Bombay House (the Tata headquarters) when, suddenly JRD walked in. That was the first time I saw 'appro JRD'. Appro means 'our' in Gujarati. This was the affectionate term by which people at Bombay House called him.
I was feeling very nervous, remembering my postcard episode. SM introduced me nicely, 'Jeh (that's what his close associates called him), this young woman is an engineer and that too a postgraduate.
She is the first woman to work on the Telco shop floor.' JRD looked at me. I was praying he would not ask me any questions about my interview (or the postcard that preceded it).
Thankfully, he didn't. Instead, he remarked. 'It is nice that girls are getting into engineering in our country. By the way, what is your name?'
'When I joined Telco I was Sudha Kulkarni, Sir,' I replied. 'Now I am Sudha Murthy.' He smiled and kindly smile and started a discussion with SM. As for me, I almost ran out of the room.
After that I used to see JRD on and off. He was the Tata Group chairman and I was merely an engineer. There was nothing that we had in common. I was in awe of him.
One day I was waiting for Murthy, my husband, to pick me up after office hours. To my surprise I saw JRD standing next to me. I did not know how to react. Yet again I started worrying about that postcard. Looking back, I realize JRD had forgotten about it. It must have been a small incident for him, but not so for me.
'Young lady, why are you here?' he asked. 'Office time is over.' I said, 'Sir, I'm waiting for my husband to come and pick me up.' JRD said, 'It is getting dark and there's no one in the corridor.
I'll wait with you till your husband comes.'
I was quite used to waiting for Murthy, but having JRD waiting alongside made me extremely uncomfortable.
I was nervous. Out of the corner of my eye I looked at him. He wore a simple white pant and shirt. He was old, yet his face was glowing. There wasn't any air of superiority about him. I was thinking, 'Look at this person. He is a chairman, a well-respected man in our country and he is waiting for the sake of an ordinary employee.'
Then I saw Murthy and I rushed out. JRD called and said, 'Young lady, tell your husband never to make his wife wait again.' In 1982 I had to resign from my job at Telco. I was reluctant to go, but I really did not have a choice. I was coming down the steps of Bombay House after wrapping up my final settlement when I saw JRD coming up. He was absorbed in thought. I wanted to say goodbye to him, so I stopped. He saw me and paused.
Gently, he said, 'So what are you doing, Mrs. Kulkarni?' (That was the way he always addressed me.) 'Sir, I am leaving Telco.'
'Where are you going?' he asked. 'Pune, Sir. My husband is starting a company called Infosys and I'm shifting to Pune.'
'Oh! And what will you do when you are successful.'
'Sir, I don't know whether we will be successful.' 'Never start with diffidence,' he advised me 'Always start with confidence. When you are successful you must give back to society. Society gives us so much; we must reciprocate. Wish you all the best.'
Then JRD continued walking up the stairs. I stood there for what seemed like a millennium. That was the last time I saw him alive.
Many years later I met Ratan Tata in the same Bombay House, occupying the chair JRD once did. I told him of my many sweet memories of working with Telco. Later, he wrote to me, 'It was nice hearing about Jeh from you. The sad part is that he's not alive to see you today.'
I consider JRD a great man because, despite being an extremely busy person, he valued one postcard written by a young girl seeking justice. He must have received thousands of letters everyday. He could have thrown mine away, but he didn't do that. He respected the intentions of that unknown girl, who had neither influence nor money, and gave her an opportunity in his company. He did not merely give her a job; he changed her life and mindset forever.
Close to 50 per cent of the students in today's engineering colleges are girls. And there are women on the shop floor in many industry segments. I see these changes and I think of JRD. If at all time stops and asks me what I want from life, I would say I wish JRD were alive today to see how the company we started has grown. He would have enjoyed it wholeheartedly.
My love and respect for the House of Tata remains undiminished by the passage of time. I always looked up to JRD. I saw him as a role model for his simplicity, his generosity, his kindness and the care he took of his employees. Those blue eyes always reminded me of the sky; they had the same vastness and magnificence.
(Sudha Murthy is a widely published writer and chairperson of the Infosys Foundation involved in a number of social development initiatives. Infosys chairman Narayana Murthy is her husband.)
Article sourced from: Lasting Legacies (Tata Review- Special Commemorative Issue 2004), brought out by the house of Tatas to commemorate the 100th birth anniversary of JRD Tata on July 29, 2004 .
In 2002, Narayanan Krishnan, a gifted young chef from Madurai, India, was a bright, young, award-winning chef with a five-star hotel group, short-listed for an elite job in Switzerland .But a quick family visit home before heading to Europe changed everything. Something he saw shocked him to his core.
