Entrepreneurial Spirit of BITS

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The BITSian Edition 2

Entrepreneurial Spirit of BITS

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Editorial Dear Readers, It gives us immense pleasure to present to you the second edition of the Annual Round Magazine of BITSAA International: The BITSian. Following up on the success of the launch of the previous edition centered around the theme “BITS: Then & Now”, the team was on a lookout for a similar theme which was contemporary and enjoyed mass appeal and thus we unanimously picked the “Entrepreneurial Spirit of BITS” as our magazine’s centerpiece.

Our 10 membered team interviewed, curated and compiled some of the best entrepreneurial experiences from across all the four campuses. We have also tried to share experiences from diverse timelines to bring out the unique and perennial set of challenges which different generations of entrepreneurs have faced and continue to face.

The purpose of bringing out this edition is to spark inspiration among generations of BITSians who harbor the dream of creating their own venture somewhere down the line. We hope the stories listed here provide you with the right approach, information on some rules of the game and access to the right set of fellow entrepreneurs to help start and scale your own business.

Besides the theme based articles, we bring to you an assortment of poems, short stories and memoirs shared by BITSians from various generations and geographies sometimes reminiscing their time at BITS, sometimes sharing that piece of life advice worth every ounce in gold or sometimes just exhibiting that creative nerve with panache.

No matter your batch, your campus or your interests, we believe that this edition will have something in store for you. So, pick up your mug of steaming coffee and sip away the wisdom we have put together for you in this edition. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as we did creating it.

Editorial Team The BITSian

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EDITORIAL

EDITORIAL

PICTURE: ‘PATIENCE’ BY NIKHIL

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Table of Contents Meet the Man Behind the First Indian Startup in Silicon Valley

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Founder’s Lounge

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I. NaviFly: Revolutionizing Air Travel

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II. Techture: Business Information Modelling

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III. Ucadme: A platform for engineering entrance preparation

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IV. Codedamn: Online platform for developers

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V. ZConnect: A HyperLocal Social Network

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VI. Earth 47: Solar Rooftop Developer

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VII. AutoVRSE: Welcome to the world of Augmented and Virtual Reality

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From BITS Pilani to Antarctica

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An American cricketing dream

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Transcience

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Remembering BITS and the 1972 - 74 class of MSc (Tech) in EEE Department 32 The Takeaway from BITS

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Picture Gallery

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The Story of a Girl from a Different World

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Asset Vault

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40 Years Reunion: Reconnect, Relive, Rewind &Amp; Rejoice- Swm40

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A BITSian spouse experience

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

MEET THE MAN BEHIND THE FIRST INDIAN STARTUP IN SILICON VALLEY

Meet the Man Behind the First Indian Startup in Silicon Valley AN INTERVIEW WITH DR. THAMPY THOMAS Dr. Thampy Thomas, PhD served as the Chief Executive Officer of PostX Corporation.

Dr. Thomas founded Nexgen Microsystems and served as its President and CEO since its inception in 1986 until 1991. He also founded ELXSI and served as its Senior Vice President of Engineering from 1979 to 1985. He served as the Chairman of PostX Corporation since August 2004 and NexGen until 1994.

He served as a Director of Invarium, Inc., Beatnik, Inc., The Vintners’ Alliance, Inc. and MicroLinear. He also serves as Director of several private companies. He served as a Director of PostX Corporation. Dr. Thomas holds Ph.D. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani. Elxsi co-founded by him in 1979 was the first startup founded by an Indian in Silicon Valley.

His entrepreneurial journey has spanned 4 decades, and is full of insights and learnings for the new generations of BITSian entrepreneur. Captured below are few nuggets of wisdom and insight for inspiring his fellow alumni Our readers would like to know more about the story of Elxsi and NexGen Microsystems.

How did Elxsi lead you to NexGen? The idea behind Elxsi was to architect a computer to expand in different directions, and add more memory to the CPU. At that time, we used DEC computer for simulating chip design. We found out that a month after we got the computer, we saturated the machine and needed to buy another one - which was expensive. After ordering, it took about 1-1.5 years to build. So clearly, there was a need for our idea in this space.

I co-founded the company with another Indian co-founder -B. Kumar(Illinois). We had the same thesis advisor at Stanford in the field of Computer architecture.

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ELXSI started with 8 cofounders. We gave a presentation to Tata Thames and JRD Tata.

Ratan Tata was Director. JRD got really excited and Tata started Tata Elxsi to start a research and development group in India.

But in 1979, the relationship between India and US govt was not so amicable. There were restrictions on export and the Indian govt. would not allow Tata to involve in that level of computing, as technology export at that time was reserved for Govt. However, all that changed in 1991, when the Indian economy was liberalized and export restriction done away with.

We started with Singapore and in 1991 we moved to India (Tata Elxsi). Our 1st R&D center opened in Bangalore and we furthered our operations in Mumbai(then Bombay) in Digital Processing.

NexGen was founded in 1986 - after computer startup, I got back into chip design business from where my career started. New architecture was being formulated both at Berkeley and Stanford - RISC(Reduced Instruction Set Computer) architecture. It ran fast but could not process any of the existing software. We needed brand new software to run machine and PC was becoming popular.

So, to execute a standard instruction set we picked Intel and used RISC architecture. Our idea was to create processors would translate code designed to run on the traditionally CISC-based x86 architecture to run on the chip’s internal RISC architecture. Intel at that time thought they could not extend the performance after 486 of X86. They had given up on it, which worried Compaq and Microsoft, as their business revolved around PC manufacturers. So we approached companies with our idea and they were excited.

Microsoft helped a great deal with architectural details to build a fast machine to run at all PCs. What would you define as the most difficult part of your journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

When you start, you always try to do something that is little beyond what people consider feasible at that point. When we started Elxsi, nobody built a multiprocessor machine before. People could connect 2-4 computers together but ours was a software that was expandable in processing power, memory etc.

Our idea was to build a machine without the software being aware how many processors in machine. It was transparent multiprocessing. We build a very fast BUS architecture, and also needed an OS that is unaware of number of CPUs in computer. We had a basic idea and nobody had done this before.

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MEET THE MAN BEHIND THE FIRST INDIAN STARTUP IN SILICON VALLEY

MEET THE MAN BEHIND THE FIRST INDIAN STARTUP IN SILICON VALLEY

NexGen used RISC computer architecture to run code that was designed to use the existing INTEL CISC architecture. This had not been done before. Thus, we faced the challenges of trying something beyond the horizon and normal challenges of raising money for a venture. ELXSI competed with DEC (mini comp manufacture). NEXGEN competed with INTEL (biggest manufacturer) Investors were worried about competing with it. However, I feel grateful to JRD Tata and Ratan Tata for believing in us and taking the risk to find ELXSI in the US. They did not have that many dollar resources either, as at that time India’s economy was a closed one.

They invested US$3mn, which was a significant percentage of their foreign resources. In the modern sense of the word, it was the first startup TATA ever funded(other than Tata Steel).

In NEXGEN, we were fortunate to have COMPAQ invest in us and Microsoft supporting,and cooperation helped in surmounting challenges

Do you think Alumni networks can play a significant role in furthering entrepreneurship? How did your alumni and Alma mater help you in your journey?

I Met Ratan(Tata) at Stanford. I had a personal connection there. Ratan was the MD of an electronics company(NELCO) in India. He has always believed in taking risks, and his latest effort with the car Nano is testimony to this ability. At that time, he was no different.

Ratan had interest in what I was doing, and was familiar with mini computers and real time controllers. He grasped what I was trying to do, and took the idea to JRD(Tata). JRD was intrigued to start a computer company in India and I was interested doing in R&D. For starting NexGen, it was helpful that we had built a fast computer and new architecture before. This gave us the much needed technical credibility. The funding team and COMPAQ and OBLIVITY were interested in our idea because their business model was at risk if they did not have a fast microprocessor. From the point of view of their business strategy they needed it as their business was based on PC software.

Thus, a coincidence of interest - corporate or financial along with credibility- all things come together magically to take an idea forward, but it’s always a personal connection that acts as a catalyst in the process.

How important is the role of your family in one’s entrepreneurial journey? How has your family supported and inspired you to become the first Indian Startup Founder in Silicon Valley?

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My parents did not understand it at all. They would rather have me come back to India and join the TATAs in India. I was a grad student when Bibha and I got married in 1972, and we were living on stanford fellowship, before I started ELXSI, My Family was of the view that I should join gp tech at Berkeley, Illinois or join HP. I took the risk and my family, most importantly my wife believed in me and supported me. This support is very important as you make no money in the start and the long hours I still joke about it - in India everyone started a company after they were married, else a father would not give his daughter’s hand in marriage We hear stories about the success of BITSian ventures and how we are present almosteverywhere, what do you think is the reason for so many people from BITS taking the plunge?

I completed my Masters in 69 and PhD in 72 . At that time, the only way an Indian in the US could become a President of company, was by starting something of their own.

There was no outright discrimination as such, but a glass ceiling existed for Indians.

That has changed now, and we see so many Indians at the helm of businesses worldwide, and in the US as well.

In India, this entrepreneurship culture is growing. It is a unique combination of factors that’s working for India now- the availability of VC in India and huge opportunity, because India is a growing market.

Draper started first VC operations in India. It funded Infosys but that money came from America. They could see the investment opportunities in 1991, but the market in India was not so huge. At that time, everyone was focused on offering services for American companies. Things have changed drastically now, and India is a huge market and growing rapidly.

Entrepreneurship culture has always been embedded in Indian culture. Traditionally, there were so many small businesses in India, but later we became conservative. The dream became to join a big company rather than develop a company. But now things are changing again. Entrepreneurship is accepted. And BITS is providing the right infrastructure and guidance to the new generation of BITSians to ride this wave. I think our strong alumni network can also open up access to VC funding for deserving BITSian startups.

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MEET THE MAN BEHIND THE FIRST INDIAN STARTUP IN SILICON VALLEY

MEET THE MAN BEHIND THE FIRST INDIAN STARTUP IN SILICON VALLEY

As an investor, what is your take on branding of products?

When I started, branding was not that important. We always sold to other companies, and the specifications mattered to technical people.

Today, that has changed. Businesses are selling to consumers directly. Many consumers don’t have in-depth knowledge of the product they are buying, so they look for names they can trust. Thus, branding becomes very important.

What have been the most prolific start-ups to have come of your aegis? Current list of investments?

The last startup I invested in was Liquid Robotics, building autonomous marine robots.

That investment came aboard through my partner from ELXSI. He had a personal interest in doing marine research, and listening to Whale sounds. He had a place in Hawaii, and postulated that would it not be nice if we had a robotic vehicle to go into ocean to listen to whale sounds?

My partner and another friend started Wave Power Robot - connected to satellite for GPS and navigation and solar panels for electricity. It started as a research to listen to whales, and then a lot of people in intelligence community, instead of restricting it to defense applications, decided to make it to commercial enterprise. Thus, Liquid Robotics was born, and 2 years later bought by BOEING, for intelligent work and offshore oil exploration Any message for the BITSians out there?

We Indians from here(in US) look at what is going in India with total admiration. It is exciting to see how entrepreneurship is thriving in India, and that in turn attracts capital and technical knowhow.

In terms of tech startup, I cannot think of any place other than India, Israel and China.

While India and China have a big enough market and consumer space, Israel is more tech oriented startups.

If I had come to America now, there is no question that I would have gone back to India.

It is really exciting to see this level of thriving business environment in the country where you came from.

So, I would like to tell the BITSian community, who are looking towards entrepreneurship, that this is a wonderful time to be an entrepreneur. So take the risk.

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Founder’s Lounge I. NAVIFLY: Revolutionizing Air Travel NaviFly is a start up which was started with an aim to provide an end-to-end service around the Autonomous Aerial Vehicle Logistics and Transport market, thus catalyzing the industry growth. In our Interview with Mr. Hrishi Uralath, he shared his amazing journey in working with the team as a Marketing Lead .

What is Navifly about?

We are an early stage start up , aiming to revolutionize the Aviation and Logistics indus-

try using Autonomous Aerial Vehicles. Virtually we will be laying down roads and traffic for the Autonomous Aerial vehicles, thereby catalyzing the industry’s development and opening doors for the future of transportation.

Can You Introduce your Team ?

I am a 3rd year Electronics and Communication Engineering (ECE) student and right now the Marketing Lead of NaviFly. I have got very enthusiastic and hardworking teammates with great vision and zeal to achieve our goal. Our team Lead is Yashodhan, who ensures that our team moves forward faster and more effectively. Our technical team is headed by Aman Shaik and supported by Akansha Das and Ashlyn D’souza. We have Shivank who takes care of the operation and strategy.

How did you guys start with NaviFly ?

NaviFly is a product developed by our team from a very vague idea which Yashodhan had. Since then, we have been building the transport of tomorrow incorporating latest

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technologies such as AI, Blockchain, Path planning, data mining etc.

How has the journey been so far ?

Our journey has been spectacular. I must say we have achieved a lot and also learned a lot from our failures. Our team came second in Dubai women’s startup weekend and we are in a seed stage at Propeller Shanon, Ireland. We got registered as a company in Ireland this February. We are in talks with U.A.E government officials to make it a reality and help U.A.E with its transportation needs and make it much more smarter and efficient.

What are some unique challenges you guys faced ?

Since our idea is futuristic, we had to find the right people/institutions to accelerate and motivate ourselves. Luckily, we have got great mentors who have helped us to make our product what it is today.

How did BITS support you in your Journey ?

Faculties from BITS have been a great support for us throughout the journey. Vincent sir has helped us by allocating a room for us to work in the creative lab and by guiding us in many other ways.

Tell us about your life here in BITS, how is it going?

BITS for me is a home away from home. It’s been a roller-coaster ride for me. BITS gave me the exposure I wanted and helped me develop as a person.

Do you have any advice to your peers?

I am not the right person to ask for advice, but I think we must never ignore even the smallest problems around us. Never run from them. We should always try finding solutions for them and believe in them because we never know, it might be the solution the world is waiting for.

What is one thing you want the world to know about your startup?

We here at NaviFly are building the transport of tomorrow. As humans we always wanted to fly and after about 119 years of the first flight, we are re-inventing the wheel which is faster, feasible, economical and sustainable!

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II. TECHTURE: Business Information Modelling Interview with Mr.Viraj Voditel, Founder and CEO

So our Readers would like to know more about the story of Techture. How did you come about ideating and creating Techture, what is it that Techture is trying to solve?

It was in my second year that I participated in a design competition organized by AutoDesk for the first time. Though we were not able to achieve a position, me and my team enjoyed working for the competition. So, in my third year in college, we decided to participate again and we won the competition at the national level and were invited to the Global Headquarters of AutoDesk for their global conference. This was a watershed moment for me. I interacted with a lot of delegates there and based on the presentations and demonstrations at the event I could visualize Business Information Modelling (BIM) as being the future in the construction industry. BIM could solve a very critical problem of the industry where people still depended on either difficult to comprehend drawings or very costly physical models to visualize any structure completely. Being from a business background, where my father runs an architectural and design firm, I was fascinated by the opportunity and decided to be one of the first ones to bring it to India. We built a bootstrapped business model where we funded our entire operations by ourselves without seeking outside funding. We had already achieved Break-Even in 2015 and have been witnessing close to 1.5-2X growth every year in our business and number of employees.

What would you define as the most difficult part of your journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

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FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

I think the initial phase was the most difficult one as of yet. Two critical problems that we faced here were the inertia amongst the clients to adopt any new technology as is typical in the construction industry and even when we got some business, managing the working capital for the business was a challenge since the timing of payments was very uncertain initially and sometimes basic expenses like paying out the salaries to our employees became a challenge.

But I believe, I was always very passionate about what I was doing, there was no question of second thoughts there. We solved the first problem by devoting the first two years to creating awareness and sales pitches. We pitched across 15 cities in as many seminars, made umpteen number of presentations and could finally make our clients adopt what was already a global phenomenon. For the second problem, we focused and moderated our growth to manage the working capital better. I think turning back was never an option, did not even cross my mind.

Did you take any help from the BITSian network (CEL or BITSspark) in your journey?

How was the support system in terms of funding and guidance from our Alma Mater?

As I mentioned, we have been following a bootstrapped business model where we don’t need to use the VC and Angels route. Yet, our Alma Mater has been instrumental in this venture from the very beginning from their support during the competition to helping us out with working space in FD-II for 2-3 years to the awesome set of people we have in our team thanks to the 6-month Practice School program which has yielded many stars for our team over the past 4 years.

We hear stories about the success of BITSian ventures and how we are present almost everywhere, what do you think is the reason for so many people from BITS taking the plunge?

I think it is because of three principal factors. One, the flexibility to do whatever you love at BITS is unparalleled at BITS. The only reason I could give so much time and energy to the AutoDesk Competition and the initial days of Techture was that I had time on my hands. Two, the people you have at BITS around you serve as inspiration in many different ways and keep you going and three, the number of opportunities that come your way, like the opportunity to participate in the competition would never be there in many other institutes.

How does one attain the level of skill and scale to start a service based business such a yours?

It is very important to acquire a very strong technical skill set to build control over what you are doing and build a strong competitive advantage in your business. Besides, I believe that there have been two critical ingredients in my journey; immense passion and

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unwavering conviction is critical for making your idea fly as might be evident from our story. The second most critical thing is the Business model you follow, rather than falling for the start-up and funding fad, determine what model suits your business and how much investor pressure can you take initially rather than burning yourself out with an out and out equity based model.

What are your plans for Techture in the near and long-term?

We are a 120 people strong company now. We have been moving towards a product based model and are already close to the Beta launch of our SaaS Project Management platform, PlanBIM.io Apart from a strong team of BIM consultants and an in-house product development team we also have people experts who are helping us move into the Virtual Reality technology space. With 1.5-2X growth, I must say these are exciting times.

Any message for the BITSians out there?

I’d say, have your priorities right and judge things by the right KPIs in life. I remember that back in BITS people were usually myopic and focused a lot on the first job that they were going to get out of the campus. That too, just the paycheck. I believe that you must try and look into the future and see what you should be doing 10 years from now. If you

III. UCADME: A platform for engineering entrance preparation Interview with Soham Bhatia, Co-Founder Our readers would like to know more about the story of Ucadme (how you went about creating it, your motivations and drivers and the journey) It started as an idea of the founder Ubaid. He had taken the course “New Venture Creation” in our 2-1, which is a crosscampus elective specifically for people who want to start their own startup.

I joined him as a co founder in our 2-2. This was when we actually started working holistically on the idea. We formed a team of 5 people – their roles included a web developer, a blogger, a business analyst, a content creator etc. 9 months later we are a team of 17 people each playing their own important role.

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Soham Bhatia Co Founder

FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

Our aim is simple : To tap into the market of 12 L students that give JEE every year, by making a platform for the preparation of engineering entrance exams that would overcome the problems faced because of conventional JEE coaching like Allen, Pace etc.

We are motivated by our own experience of preparing for JEE. Multiple team members of ours have studied in the coaching hub Kota and know the opportunities as well as the shortcomings in that place.

We had people who helped us begin our journey and overcome the difficulties faced by a startup in the ideation phase. Mridula ma’am guided us using her vast experience.

We got mentorship and guidance by BITS alumni who have had their own successful startups eg. Phyzok, Procur, Locus.sh etc.

What would you define as the most difficult part of this journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

It is difficult forming a team of talented people. The most difficult part is sustaining these people to work together and keeping the team strong. Since a startup is a risky thing to work on, getting so many people to continually work on it with unity requires us to constantly push and motivate them.

There were many times we asked ourselves “Is this really going to work ?” “Is this a good use of our precious time in college? “. But we pushed ourselves and each other to continue working on it, and gradually overcame such doubtful feelings. Interacting with successful BITSian entrepreneurs also gave us confidence and helped us overcome this.

Such thoughts still pop up in our mind sometimes, but with much lesser frequency now.

Did you take any help from the BITSian network in your journey? Were entities such as CEL/ BITS Spark a part of this journey?

Yes we took help from BITSians as mentioned above. CEL was helpful since it helped us connect to the CEL of other colleges such as various NITs. We got connected to a few mentors who are helping us develop our product and startup.

Has your Alma Mater helped or motivated you in starting up? How? Yes. Getting mentors, tapping into a strong BITSian network, using college facilities, accessing a talented pool of students has been possible because of BITS. We hear stories about the success of BITSian ventures and how we are present almost everywhere, what do you think is the reason for so many people from BITS taking the plunge?

I feel that it is a combination of multiple factors that have made BITSians omnipresent in the cream of every field. Good facilities, strong student culture, helpful alumni, admission

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IV. CODEDAMN: An online web platform for developers and coders to connect, interact and learn from each other.

Interview with Mr. Mehul Mohan, CEO Codedamn is an online web platform for developers and coders to connect, interact and learn from each other. This started as a YouTube channel (Link). We got into a conversation with Mehul Mohan, 2nd year CSE undergrad at BITS Goa about this platform. Last year, he decided to make this as a platform for programmers, which is under active development at the moment.

So our readers would like to know more about the story of codedamn (how you went about creating it, your motivations and drivers and the journey) codedamn was started (as a YouTube channel) just after my 10th boards were over (March 2015). because I wanted someplace to dump whatever I’m learning myself. Obviously, you could not use all the information all the time, so I thought why not put it on a platform like YouTube. My main motivation to create codedamn was Bucky Roberts, running thenewboston channel. I’m his big-time fan and learned a lot from him. codedamn is actually more of a personal brand for me right now than a company, but I’m working on it to make it a business slowly. As for the driving factors, as I said, mostly because I liked learning new things and did not want to simply forget them without using it 6 months from now. Hence, learn it, create content around it and push it to YouTube. It was also one of the places I could communicate to a broad audience without leaving my room during my 2-year JEE preparation.

What would you define as the most difficult part of this journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

The most difficult part for me was to put out content blindly without expecting any returns for the first 6-12-18 months. Though at the bottom of my heart I knew that a solid foundation always takes time, but still, sometimes you really expect to see results for the hard work you’re putting in a foreseeable future. However, I understand now that these difficult times were some of the best times because these are the prerequisites for growth. Second thoughts? Never. I enjoy what I do, there are difficult times for sure, but why would one give second thoughts to a thing one loves doing.

Did you take any help from the BITSian network in your journey? Were entities such as CEL/ BITS Spark a part of this journey?

New Venture Creation (NVC) which has been extremely helpful for me both in terms of

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knowledge, and networking with people from different professions (business owners, lawyers running law related startups, etc.). Other fellow BITSian entrepreneurs and startup owners are usually available to answer queries and suggest better ways to follow, so in a nutshell, I’ve received some very good advice and experience from fellow BITSians here.

Has your Alma Mater helped or motivated you in starting up? How? My school gave me a lot of opportunities to get hands-on with web development and coding in general. Although basic, we were introduced with languages like XML and HTML, which made me think about the things we could create using simple text programs. Later on, as I learned to code, I realized pretty much everything, from sending people to the moon to your pocket music player, is achieved by software is running behind it. This was an aha moment for me because I realized how powerful code can be.

We hear stories about the success of BITSian ventures and how we are present almost everywhere, what do you think is the reason for so many people from BITS taking the plunge?

If a person is good enough, nobody is stopping him/her from getting what he/she wants.

BITS does provide an environment which favors these conditions. I literally cannot imagine how grateful I’m for the zero percent attendance policy here, relieves a lot of stress and I could skip classes which I could cover later on. Other than that, seniors having their own ventures are pretty awesome and helpful. Best minds given freedom and resources can achieve a lot of unimaginable things, which seems fairly achievable here at BITS. Your message to the BITSian junta…

The only sure leverage you have right now is time, which no one can steal from you. You can always get that “job” your parents want at the age of 30-32-35-36, so go ahead and try whatever interests you, let it be music, art, dancing, anything. Steve Backley rightly said: “There are three types of people in this world. Firstly, there are people who make things happen. Then there are people who watch things happen. Lastly, there are people who ask, what happened?” Which one do you want to be?

V. ZCONNECT: A HyperLocal Social Network Interview with Akhil Kammath, CTO So our readers would like to know more about the story of ZConnect.

It all started back in second year, when we felt that the online e-commerce Facebook group was inconvenient in terms of searching for a book/product that I’d like to buy.

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We felt there should be an app dedicated to this which will make the experience more convenient. As we were discussing further we realized that there are other community centric utility features as well like cab pooling, discussion forums, a common phone directory etc, which could be built along with the buying-selling platform and would add value to the community. That’s how in a gist the concept of ZConnect as a hyperlocal social network was conceived.

What would you define as the most difficult part of this journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

The most difficult part of this journey was to maintain a team as motivated as we were.

We always had a good team. And there were a lot of BITSians involved in the process of building the app to expanding ZConnect to other colleges. But eventually our team size got smaller and smaller as they had other commitments. We are and always will be grateful to our team in college. No, we never had any second thoughts after starting up but we always did maintain a backup plan.

Did you take any help from the BITSian network in your journey? Were entities such as CEL/ BITS Spark a part of this journey?

We had enrolled ourselves in the Msc. Economic course of NVC (New Venture Creation) in our second year. The course introduced us to what a startup essentially is and informed us about the technical, business and legal aspects involved in a startup. CEL/ BITS Spark weren’t a part of our journey. However, we always got help or advice from our own alumnus who have started up.

Has your Alma Mater helped or motivated you in starting up? How? We got constant support from our mentor Dr. Mridula Goel throughout our startup journey. She always encouraged us to do better and to spread good entrepreneurial culture on campus.

We hear stories about the success of BITSian ventures and how we are present almost everywhere, what do you think is the reason for so many people from BITS taking the plunge?

It’s about the overall development the BITS environment provides, students get to learn leadership skills through teamwork in course projects and in their respective clubs and departments. Apart from this they get to learn technical skills which is the main pillar for any new budding startup.

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Your message to the BITSian junta…

If you want to startup the first thing that you should look for is your team. No matter how small is the team it the most significant asset of your startup. Make sure that your team is compatible, aligned with the vision as same as you are, and have an entrepreneurial mindset. It is always the initial team that drives the company ahead.

VI. EARTH 47: Solar Rooftop Developer Interview with Mr, Akhil Puri, Founder Our readers would like to know more about Earth 47. How did you come about ideating and creating Earth 47. What is it that Earth 47 is trying to solve?

The idea of Earth 47 took birth in Bangalore. Bangalore for many decades was an idyllic place for people to retire to because of its peaceful way of life, devoid of the chaos and pollution which is so often an inevitable part of an urban existence. Sadly, the city’s transformation from the ‘Garden city of India’ to the ‘Silicon valley of India’ has brought it to the verge of death.

The city has lost 66% of its tree cover and 74% of its water bodies in the last 4 decades.

While temperatures, which once rarely, if ever, crossed 30 degrees even in peak summer, hit 39.2 degrees in 2016. The city’s famous weather, often described as ‘naturally air conditioned’ is slowly, but surely, becoming a thing of the past- making the harsh truth of climate change undeniably real and personal.

Unfortunately this is a story which has become all too common across the globe and our unsustainable development has brought us to the brink of an existential crisis. From rising sea levels causing displacement at an unprecedented scale, to changing weather patterns harming crops, causing devastating floods in some areas to catastrophic droughts and heat waves in others, climate change threatens to destroy the way of life we have built over hundreds and thousands of years.

The grim situation made us realize that only by taking collective action can we avoid catastrophic temperature rise and transform our world for the better.

We initially decided to build a crowd funding platform to support NGOs working in the environmental space and build awareness about climate change. However after putting in substantial work and money to build the platform, we realized that the level of apathy towards this issue is extremely high and it would take substantially more capital and time to build awareness to levels where our platform could be self-sustainable.

It was at this time that we decided to pivot into a solar rooftop project developer as solar rooftop has the dual benefit of both being great for the environment and a great return on investment for the end consumer. This has helped us become a self-sustaining business, giving us the ability to stay on course for the long grind that is going to be tackling climate change. Now we are not only helping people reduce their carbon footprint but

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also delivering massive savings on their electricity bills- making it a win-win. It is our aim to build a better tomorrow together, one solar powered rooftop at a time.

What would you define as the most difficult part of your journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

Since we have good academic backgrounds giving us a great fall back option in the worst case things didn’t work out, we did not see much risk in starting up. In fact for us, the real risk would have been not to start up to take action. Because climate change and a myriad other environmental issues are threatening everything we have built up as a civilization. The clock is ticking and time is fast running out for us to take action. The clarity on there being no option but to act has helped us stay the course through the tough times and has also guided a lot of our decision making. There have been many difficult parts already in our relatively small journey, but to name a few: • When we had to decide to stop working on the crowd funding platform after putting in substantial resources. In hindsight it was our fault for starting work based on idealism without extensive testing on whether it would be viable. But this proved to be a valuable lesson. Also, it helped us become more acutely aware of the long road ahead in building awareness, making us more determined to tackle the issue. We tried to keep working on the crowd funding platform for sometime after venturing into solar rooftop, hoping to balance both. But we quickly realized that we would fail at both solar and crowd funding if we tried to do so and then had to take the hard call to stop the crowd funding platform. Though we still hope to return to it someday in some form.

• Getting our first customer for solar rooftop was a big challenge as being a start up we do not have an established brand and it takes time to build credibility, especially since the investment required for a solar rooftop is substantial. It took dozens of calls, meetings and follow ups before someone was willing to take a bet on us. We also had to learn how to promote our offering better along the way with each failed meeting.

Now, it is relatively easier for us to convert leads.

3. Did you take any help from the BITSian network in your journey?

One of the key reasons we gelled together as a team was that both of us (Shrey and Akhil) are BITSians and we could build on that bedrock of common experience. We also knew along the way that the BITS alumni network would be a great strength in tackling the challenges ahead, be it in terms of building the team, entering new markets or raising funds. So the BITSian tag has helped us in numerous ways subconsciously in terms of giving us confidence though we are yet to tap into it fully from a business perspective. Though we do happen to be connected to another BITSian featured in this edition - Divya Nawale, who inspired us with her story and was happy to share her experience

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FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

and help us in any way she could.

4. Has your alma mater helped or motivated you in starting up? How? Being a BITSian opens up a lot of doors for you and thereby your ability to take risks and succeed goes up dramatically. The BITSian education system also gives us complete freedom to decide our courses, schedules and activities and has definitely helped develop us into more autonomous individuals which is a great asset for anyone looking to venture out on their own.

5. What are your plans for Earth 47 in the near and long term?

The next step on our journey is to start expanding our footprint and establish a pan India business as quickly as possible. Solar rooftop is a highly localized business, hence it is important to have feet on street. However to do so while maintaining overall profitability requires lean and innovative business models and we are currently experimenting with a few different approaches on this. This alone is enough work to keep us busy for a few years, but eventually we also hope to help tackle problems of waste management, deforestation, pollution and other environmental concerns.

6. Your message to the BITSian junta…

The world today faces many problems which pose existential risks for us. It is critical that more of us come forward to tackle the problem of sustainable development head on.

The urgency of this cannot be stressed enough. As BITSians we are some of the few people in the world equipped to help tackle those problems and make a difference. And as they say- “If not us, then who? If not now, then when?”

VII. AutoVRSE: Welcome to the world of Augmented and Virtual Reality Interview with Mr. Ashwin Jayshankar, Co-Founder So our readers would like to know more about the story of AutoVRSE. How did you come about ideating and creating AutoVRSE, what is it that AutoVRSE is trying to solve?

I went for a summer internship at Yourstory at the end of our third year in BITS. I instantly liked the startup setting and the way things were run at the place. Then, I took my first job out of Pilani at Citi Bank. Though the job paid handsomely, I still craved for something similar to the internship experience and in fact

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wanted to start something of my own. I participated regularly in hackathons with two of my friends to pick up an interesting problem to solve and flex the problem solving muscles. We tried out two other ideas before coming up with AutoVRSE. We made a prototype of a primitive AR/VR solution as part of a project for the technical fest at BITS Pilani and loved the technology. We spent sometime looking for possible use cases for the technology and were advised by one of our friends to look into the possibility of using it for solving problems of design teams in the Automobile industry.

After spending four months on developing a prototype, we finally got some business with a leading automaker of the country. We have grown at 3-4X ever since year on year ever since and have loved every minute of this journey.

What would you define as the most difficult part of your journey? Did you ever get second thoughts after starting up OR even before you took the plunge?

Fortunately, most part of our journey till now has been a relatively smooth sail. I think the toughest of times yet was with our first project. After 4 months of hard work we finally landed a project with a leading automaker in India. It was a big task to convince everyone from the technology team to design to marketing team in itself, and the very next day of the day we landed the deal, demonetization was announced. All that hard work appeared to have gone to waste as the company pulled the plug on the project at once to prune its expenses.

It was definitely demoralizing for us. Yet, I don’t think I even considered quitting. I had made a commitment to what we were doing and this, to me, was just another hiccup.

Did you take any help from the BITSian network (CEL or BITSspark) in your journey? How was the support system in terms of funding and guidance from our Alma Mater?

The BITSian network has been pivotal in making the idea work. Right from the ideation team, to getting the initial business opportunities to the great team of people that work with us, you can see a lot of connect to our Alma Mater.

We had been clear about following a boot-strapped business model and thus have not really needed help from the Angels and VC network yet. Thus, we haven’t really approached CEL and BITSspark for help yet.

How does one attain the level of skill and scale to start a service based business such a yours?

In my case, three things helped me a lot. The first, I guess was picking up the New Venture creation course under Prof. Arya Kumar. The course did help a lot by making us run through the process of creating a venture from scratch. Secondly, my brief internship stint at yourstory helped me with figuring the kind of work environment I revel in and of course yourstory has been a great help to us at critical junctures in our journey at AutoVRSE.The third thing that I believe was the most important was committing to the cause whole-heartedly. I vividly remember the time when I would come back from

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FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

FOUNDER’S LOUNGE

office and categorically devote 6-7 hours working on developing the initial offering for the clients and mastering the technology. In the phase one while starting up, we set a 100 day target and made it a point to run mail chains providing daily progress updates.

We had decided that only if we achieve the 100 day target we would continue with the Venture and did not take a rash decision to prematurely quit our jobs.

What are your plans for AutoVRSE in the near and long-term?

From my understanding of the AR/VR market in India we are still in the early infancy stages and it might take another 4 years for the market to adopt the technology at a decent level of penetration. Given the bootstrapped model and the huge potential, we look to continue with 5X year on year growth within this time frame.

While we started out as a firm developing solutions for design and operations teams in the manufacturing industry. It has been interesting to note the inclination of marketing teams of various MNCs across industries to adopt the technology to develop superior pre sales customer experiences. For example, a leading dishwasher manufacturer used our expertise to demonstrate the effectiveness of dishwashers to customers reluctant to adopt the product. The success rate of sales pitches in that particular year spiked up to 35% from just 5% initially leading to the adoption of the solution in the German and British markets as well. Similarly we have been creating superior sales pitch experiences for Auto, Retail and Pharma sector as well.

In terms of the business model, we are looking to move to the customizable product based model from the current service based model. We are always looking to structure our business processes and maintain sustainable growth rates.

Any message for the BITSians out there?

One of the key things I have learned in the brief journey we have had over the past three attempts at creating a Venture is to keep trying and learning on the go. It is never a good idea to sit back and keep ideating, you need to put things into motion to get a tangible outcome. Discuss what you intend to do with as many relevant set of people as possible, nobody is going to steal the idea away from you and the insights and the assistance received will be invaluable. Make a measurable commitment and follow it through completely and things will work out just fine :)

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From BITS Pilani to Antarctica DIVYA NAWALE ( 2003A4PS297) In 2009, I became the first BITSian woman and the youngest BITSian (until 2018) to step on the 7th continent, Antarctica. But I probably wouldn’t have gone to Antarctica if I didn’t go to Pilani. This story is about how BITS inspired me to go to Antarctica and helped me find my way to a life of meaning and purpose. It’s been 9 years since my first time to the frozen continent; and in February 2018, I went back to serve in the role of a Director for 2041 Antarctica Foundation, the same organization that took me there the first time. And the way I was able to help the youngest BITSian to Antarctica this year is another story.

My Antarctic journey began in the Lecture Theater Complex (LTC) that opened in Pilani in 2003. I was a part of the first ever batch to experience sitting in those large gallery classrooms! However, I was a lost soul at BITS. I didn’t really want to do engineering but ended up at Pilani by happenstance. Yet, going to Pilani has also been my life’s biggest blessing. I am proud to be a BITSian and it has been my identity no matter where in the world I have been and will go. It was there that I found my greatest passion for dancing as a Dance clubber and my biggest mission in life- to help make the world a better place, while working with the construction workers and teaching the local kids through the on-campus clubs like the National Service Scheme(NSS) and My India (later renamed to Nirmaan). I learnt more about practicing resilience, building self-esteem, developing confidence, and making real friends than I ever imagined.

It was in my 3rd year at Pilani during 2006, when one of the Silver jubilee reunions took place on campus, bringing back alumni from different parts of the world to their alma mater 25 years later. On a fine Sunday morning, I went to attend a guest lecture in the LTC of a particular alumnus who was visiting for his reunion, Mr. K.C. Ramakrishnan of the 1976 batch, who worked for BHEL and had been on a mission to Antarctica testing non-conventional energy sources (solar panels!!) at the Indian polar station Dakshin Gangotri, carrying out research there in 1988. I vividly remember till this day, looking at the big screens with the images of the icy continent calling out to me. I knew it in my gut that I was meant to go there. That presentation inspired me to write down three dreams for life: to visit Antarctica someday, to work for renewable energy/ sustainability to make the world a better place, and come back to Pilani someday with an inspiring story like that during my batch silver jubilee reunion.

I just didn’t know that one of those dreams would come true only 3 years later in November of 2009. In the summer of that year, I was working on a story for publicizing the global event called ‘Earth Hour’ in The Hindu newspaper Young World section, as a freelance features editor. During my research, I stumbled upon this website www.2041. com, which looked too good to be true. This was pre-Facebook era in India, so I had no way of checking out their Facebook/Instagram page to confirm the authenticity of the

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FROM BITS PILANI TO ANTARCTICA

FROM BITS PILANI TO ANTARCTICA

program that took young leaders from across the world to Antarctica on annual expeditions to make them environmental champions. Nor could I easily reach out to other people who had already been because they didn’t have facebook/ or even Orkut profiles.

Despite the audacity it for me took to believe that this was a real genuine program and could be the biggest opportunity of my life, I knew somehow this is what I wanted to do and who I wanted to be. So I applied. And I got selected. Sir Robert Swan OBE, who is the first person in history to walk unassisted to both the South and North Poles and the Guinness record holder of this feat, somehow thought that a young 22-year old girl from India had the potential to change the world.

While BITS made me dream this dream, it was BITSAA who helped me make this dream truly come true! Earlier that year, I had helped BITSAA with a bit of media and outreach for the projects they were working on (again this was for The Hindu; some of these articles are still available online). When I had to raise funds for my own expedition, I wondered if BITSAA would help me as a recent graduate. So got in touch with Mr. Viggy Mokkarala, who was the Chapter leader for BITSAA Silicon Valley chapter back then. I had worked with him closely over the summer for the outreach bit so I hoped that he would see I was credible enough and that I imbibed the BITSian spirit. He immediately agreed to help (That’s why I absolutely love that our Facebook group is called ‘BITSians for each other’)! And with the coordination with Mr. Kartik Bandhuvula who was the Fundraising coordinator for BITSAA back then, I was provided funds to travel to Antarctica (covering my flights, gear and insurance). Dream no. 1 achieved.

Going to Antarctica changed my life. I came back with the clear purpose and idea to work in the sustainability space and embrace eco-friendly living. While I already knew I wanted this, the expedition gave me a sense of direction and provided me with resources and a network. I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time, to engage with 2041 Foundation in 2010-11 and got the opportunity to work for them in India for multiple projects. Once again, BITSAA recognized this during 2012 in the form of a 30-Under-30 Award under the category “Social Entrepreneurship and community building”. This way I kept pursuing relentlessly for Dream no. 2, which I continue to do today and is my life’s mission.

In 2014, a version of dream no. 3 came true when BITSAA approached me again- this time to speak and share my Antarctic story at the BITSAA reunion taking place at the BITS Hyderabad campus. I jumped at the opportunity. In front of many of my own personal BITSian heroes like Dilip D’Souza, Dean Prof. B. R. Natarajan, and sharing stage with other inspirational seniors like Phanindra Sama, in my very own hometown of Hyderabad, I shared my story – with the very first slide being a picture of our beloved LTC in BITS Pilani. I have never been to Pilani since I left in 2007 and I have yearned to return.

Dream no.3 will become a true reality when I go back to Pilani for my silver jubilee reunion, and my work may help inspire more young minds at Pilani then, to dream their dream and follow it, and know that BITS and BITSAA will always have their back.

This is my story, and I owe it to BITS Pilani

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An American cricketing dream VENU PALAPARTHI (1987B3A7527)

A decade after I started a cricket academy in New Jersey, and six years after entering the resulting team into a cricket league, my development team, comprising mostly US born and bred youngsters under 18 years of age, achieved something remarkable in 2018 - they earned a promotion to Division A. And three of them have received a call-up from the national team. I can truly say my American dream finally has come true (my academy is called DreamCricket).

The DreamCricket boys started as 10 and 11 year olds playing against men twice their size and thrice their age. In their first year in the league, in 2012, they finished 12th out of 14 teams, barely avoiding scraping the bottom thanks to teams that dropped out midway.

They held onto that 12th spot in 2013 among 16 teams and slipped one rank to 13th out of 18 teams in 2014. The 2015 season-opener was special for that reason. As the boys entered their teens, they gained a bit of strength and confidence. It was a coming of age for the Colts. They were not the underdogs anymore.

As 2015 season drew to a close, the Colts placed sixth out of eighteen teams. The following year, they made the playoffs. In the 2017 season, they were in the playoffs again.

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AN AMERICAN CRICKETING DREAM

AN AMERICAN CRICKETING DREAM

Their fifth place finish among twenty two teams earned a promotion to Division B for 2018. In 2018, the Colts lost just one game the entire season and finished as Division B Champions as they defended 177 against Rangrez CC. And just like that, six years after the young starry eyed Colts attempted a lift-off from the bottom of Division C, they are now a Division A team.

To be sure, there is still more distance to cover for this bunch both in this league and in their cricketing careers. After all, they are really only just getting started.

Two of them, Raymond Ramrattan and Harish Easwaraiah, debuted for USA Under-19 last year. A third, Rohan Arvindh, is considered a prospect for 2019. Others including Jaynil Patel, Chirag Ballani, Aditya Billur, Arvind Jayakanth, Anirudh Immanuel and Varun Venkateshan have earned significant praise. The first five of these boys are still 17 or below. Thirteen year-old Anirudh Immanuel lit up the bowling charts for the Colts in 2018 with 21 wickets. Varun, who started playing cricket when he was fourteen, is eigh-

teen now and has been rated NYCL’s Best Bowler in the U18 age category for two years running. One player, Advait Manur, moved to England where he continues to play with Southampton University CC. DreamCricket Colts at the inaugural NYCL U16 tournament (which they won) in 2014 These boys, many of whom came to DreamCricket in 2008 as 6 and 7 year-olds, have

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developed a winning habit having brought home the National U18 championship two years in a row, won the AAU Olympics Gold in 2013, the NYCL U16 championship in 2014 and 2015 and the EYCL U16 championship in 2017.

The DreamCricket Colts have also become role models for DreamCricket’s younger teams – the Warriors (U16), Panthers (U14), Thunder (U14 development), Cubs (U12) and Lightning (U10). In time, these teams have begun winning tournaments as well. You ask them where they see themselves in the future, they will tell you they want to play for the Colts. A majority of the Colts players are selecting colleges in the New Jersey area so that they can continue their cricket with the Colts.

Of course, all of this was just a dream for us at DreamCricket back in 2007 when we opened the DreamCricket Academy in New Jersey. Back then, we were one of just two indoor facilities in the country. There were no age-group teams in New Jersey and coaches were few. We began conducting camps to recruit kids because not a lot of kids were playing cricket in 2008. We hoped to somehow find enough cricket playing kids to make two teams - a very modest goal.

Our first camp at the Far Hills Fairgrounds attracted just eight kids. From that point, it became our single-minded mission to find the best coaches and mentors for DreamCricket Academy – Bharath Kumar, Ian Pont, Balvinder Singh Sandhu, Earl Daley, Ajit Tendulkar, Damion Morgan, Malika Frank, Linden Fraser - all have coached the kids over the years.

There were also one-off clinics and mentorship sessions conducted by VVS Laxman, Syed Kirmani, Stuart Macgill, Lance Gibbs, Sunil Gavaskar, Courtney Walsh and Ricardo Powell. Ultimately, it was Coach Daley who made sure the boys and girls had a coach if they chose to stick around. A Jamaican first class player who played alongside Courtney Walsh and Errol Brown, Coach Daley played for USA after he moved to this country. His batting partnership with Brown of 313 runs in the Red Stripe Cup is a record that stands to this day. His resume includes stints as coach and chief selector for the USA national team. On mostly overgrown outfields in the U.S., where cricketers’ preferred way of getting runs is to hit the ball in the air, Coach Daley emphasizes timing, technique and playing as a team. Around the country, people have spoken to me privately about the soundness of the DreamCricket player’s approach. Coach Daley is responsible for inculcating that discipline.

The Colts’ first weekly games in CLNJ are played against teams whose players were twice their age. If I said it was a rough start for the Colts in 2012 - that would be an understatement. The boys were far too young and they struggled to post big scores initially. In the US, the only way to get the scoreboard ticking is for the batsmen to hit the ball big and in the air. As Joseph O’Neill wrote in his award-winning novel Netherland about his cricket

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AN AMERICAN CRICKETING DREAM

AN AMERICAN CRICKETING DREAM

ground in New York, “The outfield is uneven and always overgrown, even when cut (once chasing a ball, I nearly tripped over a hidden and, to cricketers, ominous duck).”

Of course, the Academy suffered from poor economics for much of its existence. The DreamCricket Academy is a loss leader, we told ourselves, but good times will come. We persevered in the hope that if enough kids started playing cricket, it would all be worthwhile in the long run.

By 2014, we had reached the end of the loss-leader tunnel. The point of inflection we had been waiting eagerly for seemed nowhere in sight. We shut down our indoor nets and our retail business dwindled but we continued the Academy. Coach Earl Daley and some of the Colts boys stuck with us. DreamCricket as we knew it eventually wound down in 2017 and a leaner version with just the academy, a portal and a store resumed later that year, barely hanging on to the cricketing dream despite the many setbacks.

The much awaited turn of fortunes finally arrived in 2018.

2018 was rewarding in other ways as well. Thanks to Franklin Township Board of Education, DreamCricket Academy’s kids, many of whom come from Somerset, now have the use of two grounds to practice and play on throughout the year. Of course, we have outgrown those two grounds and need two more in order to play home games and keep growing. More importantly, we now have six DreamCricket girls, four of whom call cricket their primary sport.

We have also begun giving back to the community in a big way over the years, raising over $10,000 for the causes we care deeply about. We have contributed most of the money to the American Cancer Society. More recently, the Franklin Food Bank has been a beneficiary as well. The 2018 ‘Cricket For A Cure’ event will be held on October 27th and our fundraising goal for this year is a modest $5,000.

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Transcience DURJAI SETHI (2015A8PS489P) Here’s a poem I wrote when I was in my fourth semester at BITS Pilani, Pilani campus. It was in the month of March, the spring of 2017. I sat down in the corner of the rotunda, facing the clocktower, gazing.

Which is when this narrative came to me, and I jotted it down as an ode to this beautiful campus and the time spent here. It’s called ‘transience’ for it made me realize how ephemeral everything is, and soon our stay at this wonderful place would come to a close and we would carry it with us forever, in our memory and in our heart.

As she sits alone, legs stretched out long, back against the wall, In front of her, the ticking tower, in all its might stands tall, As she sits alone, with her cherished tunes, ringing in her head, Slowly, peacefully, she watches the sun drown in its own red,

And she sits alone, alone mind you, not lonely, For she is blessed with an enviable company, The gliding wind, which dies down into the east, This golden hour, to her eyes is indeed a feast,

The wind brushes by, gently kissing her left cheek, The sun lets out one of its last rays, just to take a peek, The best part of the day has started to fade away, “Stop, please, just pause and keep the dusk at bay”,

Doesn’t she know it’s such a vain request, It’s slipping away, it won’t obey her behest, In the dying moments, when bitter acceptance sinks in, She desires to capture this moment, and take it all in,

“I feel this bliss embracing me”, It gives warmth and oozes glee, Snap out of this dream, they say, It’s gone now, alike a needle in hay,

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TRANSCIENCE

TRANSCIENCE

This terrible transience trembles all, Everything is now in an unbreakable fall, As she sits in the corner they call the lover’s spot, The witness, who has seen honest promises rot,

It has seen “forever” get lost in impermanence, Now, she has started to become fearful of this transience, Soon, she won’t be able to call herself a part, Of this “magic”, which has now become a piece, of her beating heart.

NOSTALGIA CORNER PICTURE BY VIIVEKANANDAN M.

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Remembering BITS and the 1972 - 74 class of MSc (Tech) in EEE Department NARESH CHAND (1972E46013) The EEE Department offered a unique 2-year Master of Science & Engineering, M.Sc. (Tech) program for M.Sc. (Physics) degree holders like me. This was supported by UGC under a special 10 year-program to meet the country’s manpower requirements in Electronics. Because of its collaboration with CEERI and other factors, BITS was very famous for education in Electronics. Physics and Electronics are a deadly combination.

As a result, the course produced many luminaries including the past BITS VC, Professor LK Maheshwari who graduated in the first batch. Maheshwari ji was our teacher also. His courses on semiconductor devices lay the foundation for my career. The M.Sc. (Tech) and M.E. courses in Electronics were jointly conducted for 15 and 10 students, respectively. I consider myself lucky to be admitted to this fantastic course which changed my life trajectory. Unfortunately, the course was discontinued after 1975.

BITS had collaboration with MIT. Many faculty members had previously studied or taught in the US. Our EEE Department had a visiting Professor Sheila Prasad Hinche from the US. Her American-born husband was also a visiting professor in the Mathematics Department. Professor Hinche taught and conducted research on microwaves. I believe BITS and IIT Kanpur were the only two Indian universities at that time which were teaching and evaluating students based on US system using grades and CGPA. BITS had the most advanced computer center. Our Director, Dr. CR Mitra, who had studied at MIT and Columbia, was a highly visionary person who introduced many innovative educational philosophies. Our EEE Dept. had the most advanced Microwave teaching and research lab where several of us completed work for our master’s theses. It’s founder famous Dr. M. Chaudhury had left BITS and no replacement was hired. As a result, the lab unfortunately was shut down after our batch. This was regrettable. One of our notable and inspiring professors was TSKV Iyer who was also the Deputy Director. Besides teaching Network Systems, occasionally he used to share inspiring stories and institute policies.

The years 1972-74 witnessed a great transformation of BITS. The student union had a long hunger strike with many demands. Most of them were eventually accepted. During the strike, India’s future Prime Minister, Late Shri Chandrashekhar, also visited the campus and addressed the students. We lived in Ram Bhavan and Malviya Bhavan during our I st and 2nd year, respectively. During both years, the Mess Secretaries and Hostel Representatives were from our class. Our mesh provided breakfast, lunch and dinner besides

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REMEMBERING BITS AND THE 1972 - 74 CLASS OF MSC (TECH) IN EEE DEPARTMENT

REMEMBERING BITS AND THE 1972 - 74 CLASS OF MSC (TECH) IN EEE DEPARTMENT

evening tea with snacks every day. Aloo pranthas with butter and yogurt, aloo puri, and Dosa in breakfast were our favorites. We looked forward to Sunday feasts, French fries with lunch and dinner every day and Chhole Bhaturae on Saturdays. The water was like a tonic. It will help in digesting everything. Because of rising costs in 1974, at one time Dosas were limited to a maximum of 4. Our classmate Satyanarayana (satya) acted like an Eagle. He was fond of DOSAs. He will come out of nowhere and snatch our dosas.

I often think of our postman, Mahesh ji who had a remarkable memory. He could meet a person once and remember his name and face. He could remember if we had mail or not without even looking through his big pile of letters for that day. If the letter was from a student’s girlfriend, he would be sure to deliver it in person. He was admired by everyone, and we all remember him even today. Back then, there was not much outside the campus. Few shops in Connaught and Nutan markets were able to fulfill all our needs.

Connaught was very lively. Connaught had a high end Restaurant Volga where we also used to enjoy occasional parties. In 1994, I went back to Pilani under a UNDP project to help CEERI. I was disappointed to find that most of the shops including Volga in Connaught had shut down. I hope things have improved now. However, in the main building of the institute, I saw the Honors Board with my name for the 1974 ME/MSc(Tech) class (pictured right). That the Institute had kept the board for twenty years was a pleasant surprise! At our time there was no convocation to save costs and inconvenience. I received my gold medal and degree by mail.

Twice the founder of BITS, Sir GD Birla visited the campus and addressed us with very inspiring speeches. The first time, he came with Field Marshall Sam Manekshaw who too gave a very inspiring and powerful speech in the open ground of the campus. Just a year before, India had won the historic war with Pakistan under his command. I guess this speech inspired four of my classmates to join defense services. They were Ashwini Kumar (Navy, civil side), Gr. Cap. SP Chaturvedi (Air Force), Colonels Subodh Kumar and Satyanarayana (Army). My salute to them. SP and Subodh are in the photo. The second time, Birla ji came with Pujya Swami Chinmayananda Saraswati ji who gave a week-long discourse on the Bhagavad Gita and introduced us to spirituality. My continued pursuits of spirituality have helped keep my head and heart clean, making me feel the presence of the Divine within and around me always.

Thank you, BITS and Sir GD Birla ji.

Naresh Chand, New Jersey, USA

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The Takeaway from BITS DR. NITA CHANDRASEKHAR (2005P1PS756G) A decade post-graduation is the perfect time to reminisce about the best time in anyone’s life – at college. It is human nature to forget the unpleasantness but savor the highlights of a time gone past. It is the perfect length of time to reflect on the essence of the BITS experience, the frustrations and angst of academics long forgotten, with rosy memories of friendships, innovation, enthusiasm and cheer intact.

It is also a good time to reflect on what the real takeaway is, from the education imparted at BITS. While specifics of exams or lessons fade, memories of conversations in friends’ rooms well past midnight over strong tea remain fresh as ever. Education isn’t just about academics.

I’m not talking about grades, CGPA’s, the L.O.P’s, S.O.P’s and the countless homework assignment or exams, I’m referring to the experience of being amongst incredibly bright, supremely talented young adults with stars in their eyes. I can still recall the idle chatter idolizing a rock band artist, sitting next to a group working on a project for their hackathon with another party working out the details of their important multiplayer-LAN game match in a buzzing hole in the wall tea shop on campus. The privilege of getting to watch up close some of the best guitar performances, dance troupes, singers, computer programmers, hackers and robotics enthusiasts or savvy businesspeople-to-be is unmatched. My fondest memories include watching the geniuses emerge on exam nights to pelt out key ‘funde’ or concepts over hot plates of Maggi surrounded by hordes of fellow batch mates’ the night before an important exam. The thrill of playing trivia over LAN, requesting last-minute help with syllabus and tutorial numbers or just idling on side-walks watching the twinkling lights of the nearby city savoring the cool night breeze bring a smile to my face every time. The experience of learning a new hobby or instrument or dancing enthusiastically at visarjans and dance nights remain unmatched.

Everyday brought a lesson in how to learn, unlearn and re-learn anything which is the key to succeed in the modern world. What BITS really gave me, was not just an education, but a world view and experience, unlike any other.

Being one of the first batches to graduate from the Goa campus, the opportunities to pave the way for future generations of students were in plenty. The spirit to create something new and big drove every single student on campus. Be it the drive to have better mess catering or develop new eateries on campus, or to establish new cultural and

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THE TAKEAWAY FROM BITS

THE TAKEAWAY FROM BITS

technical festivals in the best possible way with the available resources, or to force the development of sports facilities – the entrepreneurial spirit of a BITSian shined through.

It is precisely these experiences – the process of setting something up, working in large teams, negotiating, compromising and daring to dream and believe are what make the BITS experience unique and special. It is also these memories and experiences that remain, long after the formulas and syllabus have vaporized from memory.

These skills honed and developed at my alma mater have been used repeatedly, in the decade since. The can-do attitude, combined with the smarts to envision, work-hard, execute which form the drivers for success, form the hallmark of any graduating BITSian.

To all the current students, my only nugget of advice would be to stop, pause for a moment and look around. Savor the company of people surrounding you, relish the conversations you are having and enjoy the time spent in friends’ rooms solving the world’s problems. Listen to the new perspectives and ideas, learn that new piece of music, organize the next event, form real in- person friendships, play those games, join those clubs and idle away on side-walks and over dinner. It is these memories, lessons and experiences that are the real takeaways from your education and will hold you in good stead in the face of everything to come.

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Picture Gallery

SWAYAM PRABHA (2012A8PS254P)

GRE

BRONZED DRONGO

CHERRY BLOSSOMS

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PICTURE GALLERY

PICTURE GALLERY

CHRIMSON ROSE

EATER YELLOW NAPE

FLAMINGOES

Swayam is a photographer and an Electrical and Electronics Graduate from the class of 2016, Pilani Campus. Her main subjects for photography are birds.

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The Story of a Girl from a Different World SIDRA RAIHAN (2015A9TS0353U) LIFE BEFORE And I will tell you the story of a girl called Sara ,who as a kid had only dreamed, Of all the entrancing wishes that were more unattainable than they seemed.

Of playing with pixies in their shenanigans, Of fairies,magic and fantasies, Living in the clouds of her own imagination, faraway from dark realities.

Of building sandcastles with her Mom , of stealing shells and corals from the sea shore, Of painting calligraphy with her Dad , of singing Disney songs that everyone would adore.

Of exploring Wonka’s chocolate factory and shopping with Harry Potter at Diagon Alley, Of riding on merry-go-rounds and of sailing paper boats in the puddles of their own valley.

But that day, she didn’t weep when her favorite glow-in-dark shoes no longer fitted her, Then Grandma said , ‘ Be it joy or sorrow. Be it people,things or places. Nothing stays forever.’

As the years rolled by, they watched how the apple of their eye had grown, Surpassing others in wits and words -an extraordinary girl-she was now known.

On the shelves where Teddy Bears and Barbie dolls once quietly slept, Awards of poetry, quizzes, Olympiads, and debates were proudly kept.

Those tiny feet which couldn’t even walk, forget about playing Hide-and-Seek Would now run races, fall down but still move on for they were no longer weak On the Old Telly where Looney Toons and The Simpsons were once watched, Channels like BBC,Discovery and Animal Planet became much more cherished.

The baby-pink bedroom walls now painted white ,reflected an aura of maturity, Shakespeare’s plays and Archer’s mysteries now satisfied her innate curiosity.

Finally, came the Grand Evening! Cheers, claps and celebrations echoed loud in the hall, From the 8-year-old girl in a red frilly frock who kept her parents at every beck and call.

Now walked a brave and ambitious 18 year old, garbed in her Graduation robe she smiled, While she collected her High School Valedictorian Award, in joy ,her parents cried.

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THE STORY OF A GIRL FROM A DIFFERENT WORLD

THE STORY OF A GIRL FROM A DIFFERENT WORLD

LIFE AFTER From a crumbling home, we watch mass graves of children choked by toxic gas, In the blink of an eye, there is a vehement bang of missiles and body parts begin to amass.

Running for cover,we reach Douma where to my appalling horror, rivers of blood flow, Known for Palmyra, this nation is now nothing but a saga of grenades, savagery and woe A kid cries when he picks his sister who is on the verge of dying from the flesh-eating disease, I walk to him but he raises his hands ,fearing me to be a sniper who is ready to kill and seize.

On the radio, all they hear is Obama’s speech, UN talks as transient peace treaties are signed, She has lost her parents and five years of life but not her resolve which has been redefined.

Cramped in a squalid refugee camp ,she educates the young and treats the sick for free, ‘I had read Anne Frank’s Diary’ she weeps ,‘but never thought it could also happen to me’, ‘It was March 2011 and in no time four years of my life at Medical School had passed by, As boys painted graffiti and girls protested with posters- ‘Revolution’ we would cry, Until one day, Assad’s tanker fired bombs ,the University burnt down and nothing remained.

But I promise , that once I return, I will bring change and the war will soon be waned’.

Today, she will go on a perilous journey with 1000 refugees across the Mediterranean Sea, So she can fulfill her father’s dream to be a doctor and live her new life with hope and glee.

I fear that if I interview her a minute more, she might even break down in despair, So we chit-chat and she sings ‘Ya haeef’ and ‘We Shall Overcome’ in her patriotic flare.

Suddenly,she stops and before we realize, her blood splatters on our camera lens, Shooting a bullet at her heart, they martyred a warrior who could be Syria’s Rosa Parks.

And I pen these words today with anguish, repugnance and tears welling in my eyes, Not as a writer but as a human who doesn’t want the world to suppress Sara’s cries.

I write so that every courageous Sara can pursue her dreams and return happily to the Life Before , I write for a 3-year-old Alan Kurdi whose drowning forced other nations to finally open their door.

I will write as long as the darkness of every night is overpowered by the morning’s glow and zest.

I will write till the tyrant kisses his grave when heinous crimes become a burden on his chest.

I will write till our hardhearted leaders and avaricious politicians can no longer ignore and flee.

I will write even if poetry is what it takes for the world to listen to every Syrian’s desperate plea.

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Asset Vault THE SMART WAY TO LOG AND PROTECT YOUR ASSETS VISHNU CHUNDI, 2003B5A3439, BITS-PILANI (CEO and Co-founder of AssetVault UK Limited (Techstars London company))

The first seeds of startup interest were sowed during APOGEE 2006 as a member of the EEE Assoc. We made a rudimentary Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) device and built a business model around it to sell it to security agencies worldwide for secure communication. I also published a review article on the topic and secured the opportunity to write my Master’s thesis at the University of Geneva on QKD in 2007.

At the time, I discovered the lack of operating expertise and business acumen needed to build a company and hence decided to invest the next few years in strengthening my skill set ahead of taking a second shot at entrepreneurship.

I worked at Bain and Company, Delhi and moved to the UK to pursue MPhil in Nanotechnology and Enterprise at the University of Cambridge. One of the things that I learnt at BITS was to keep an open mind and be curios. In 2011 when I graduated from Cambridge, I noticed a wave of fintech spreading across the UK with some new problems being solved by the Technology companies. I joined the first fintech unicorn, Wonga as a Product manager as one of the early employees and saw them grow to a 1000 employees and expand into five countries. I became Head of New Products and was practicing entrepreneurship and definitely worked on my skill set to get the confidence to design and launch fintech products.

Following Wonga, I went to the London Business School for my full time MBA to startup AssetVault. It’s not been easy to startup a company in the UK as an Indian national but going back to school helped me figure out the path to do so by leveraging the resources that are available and not to mention the spare time. When you are not in the job recruiting phase and partied enough, B school opens a lot of time. AssetVault (www. asset-vault.com) was born out of a personal need. My uncle, a successful businessman between New Delhi and Dubai passed away with out making a Will and without a catalogue of his assets. It took about six months to locate and understand the nature of all his assets and their distribution led to an ugly dispute in the family.

With my co founder and our small team in Pakistan and India, we built the AssetVault

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ASSET VAULT

ASSET VAULT

prototype. We built the UK’s most sophisticated digital Will accompanied by an asset catalogue that lets people have a consolidated view of their latest net worth across physical and digital assets.

AssetVault won a $120k Investment from TechStars in 2016. The team made rapid progress with the product, brand and partnership week on week during the program. We are also the only non-US Finalists at SXSW Austin in 2017.

AssetVault made it through to the FCA Sandbox on June 2017 as one of the top 20 Fintechs in the UK and are now fully authorized by the FCA (huge barrier to entry in a regulated environment such as insurance) We sell our suite of products and services to some of the largest Financial Institutions in the World to help them get a deeper share of wallet with their existing customers and acquire new customers. Our mission is to protect your assets today and tomorrow. We have just entered the Indian market and are setting up an office in Hyderabad in 2019 to hire the future leadership of the company. Grateful to the BITSian network for all their support on this journey.

You can see a visual depiction of our journey here: https://ewill.io/our-journey/

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40 Years Reunion: Reconnect, Relive, Rewind & Rejoice- Swm40 ANONYMOUS

A long rewind, 24 th July 1978. We (384 of us) came from far away cities in Kashmir valley, Southern plains, Deccan plateau, Rajasthan Desert, Hooghly Delta, Chambal Valley and many other remote corners of India. Last stretch of journey from Loharu / Chirawa was quite a surprise for many. Many would have travelled on the roof of a rickety bus. Looking back, we have collectively achieved something very significant. We have kept our contacts alive over the years and met very often thanks to few visionary leaders amongst us like AnuSheel Bajaj, Gurudutt, Vijay Nevrekar, Vivek Ladha, ... Among the 12 occasions we met globally, twice we came to Pilani (2003 & 2008). We visited every nook & corner of the campus and we relived our college days. We rejoiced, we shared the joy with our families who accompanied us. Unbelievable even today, we are over 300 batch mates still in touch with each other, though settled in different parts of the world.

Reconnect: A narration of our 12th Get Together (G2G) The ‘78 Batch got together in Pilani, 16-18 th Nov 2018, to celebrate 40 years of togetherness. More than 45% of the batch - 170 batch mates - many with companions, entered the welcoming gates of the campus on Nov 16 th to Reconnect, Relive, Rewind and Rejoice together at an event aptly titled SWM40 (SinceWeMet 40) The ’78 Batch enjoys extra-ordinary bonhomie being the first assigned batch in the history of BITS Pilani. This unique advantage was welcomed greatly by the senior batches that had to slug it out to get their preferred degrees or branches as it was known. The genesis of the bonhomie mentioned earlier was greatly influenced by the kind treatment by the senior batches. They treated 78ers to goodies at the Redi / Connaught/Nutan and other places, in return for doing their chores and entertainment that 78ers provided. The ‘78 Batch has been meeting periodically over the years. However, the SWM40 was identified as “Mother of all get-togethers”. The Insti provided accommodation, Audi and Vfast for the batchmates to sing, dance and make merry. The overwhelming response by 78ers to return to Pilani, where they rolled in grades & sands while celebrating life every day, posed a challenge in terms of accommodation.

An enterprising 78er, Pragnya Nimkar Seth, scouted for rooms in and around Pilani and identified options like Surajgarh Fort, Neelkanth Bagar Inn, Sunshine Hotel et. al. and voila-accommodation needs were fully addressed. Pragnya, the batch interlocutor, was in constant communication with the “Insti” to ensure that all arrangements were in order and we all have an unforgettable experience. A group of ten batch mates (Ajay

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40 YEARS REUNION: RECONNECT, RELIVE, REWIND & REJOICE- SWM40

40 YEARS REUNION: RECONNECT, RELIVE, REWIND & REJOICE- SWM40

Bhargava, Amit Sheth, Anusheel Bajaj, Ashok Daniel, Devender Rustagi, PB Gurudutt, Pragnya, Solomon, Vijay Goyal and Vivek Ladha), identified as G-10 took charge as “Event Managers” each with a distinct role. G-10 was introduced on Nov 16 to a jam packed Audi in order of the CGPA each had desired.

Living up to the 78 spirit, batch mates Prashanth Palakurthi & Aditya Singhal convinced Anuradha Palakurthi to gift a show aptly titled “The Desert Storm” - customized

by Juju Productions. This encouraged many of our batch mates to be together at the oasis. Anuradha got the desert that cradles the campus, to experience a storm. The Audi was at capacity - close to 1500 people (staff and students included) in the auditorium.

The magic of Anuradha got people on their feet. When the dance floor was over-crowded, the merry makers used the aisles. Anuradha Palakurthi, Juju, is a gifted hypnotist who uses songs, irrespective of genre to make people cry or dance in a trance till they drop at her will.

A grand start it was - The Desert Storm- to the reunion of 170 batch mates who had travelled from various locations (Kashmir to Kanyakumari in India, and 13 countries). Musicians - 40 of them - renowned for scoring music for several Bollywood super-hit films provided Juju support to set the Audi floor on fire with foot stomping music and outstanding blend of sound and lights providing the fuel Nov 17 th witnessed a “Blast from the Past” with the yester year stars of 78-83 belting soulful numbers at the Audi and Vfast. Of course, the support of the Music Club and the Alumni Relations team made it possible for us. Batchmates revisited places, including class rooms, where stories were written to be recalled only by the beholders. Batch mates connected with students and faculty to brainstorm ways and means of alumni contributing to the alma mater.

72 hours at SWM40 disappeared in a blink. Everyone relished the memorable Sunday lunch specially catered on a Saturday at the VKB mess. Thank you “Insti” for the cassata and unlimited potato chips.

We were longing to relish it again for the last 35 years!

Sadly it was time to leave. Amidst hugs, goodbyes, choked voices, moist eyes and promises to keep in touch, we silently hummed: “Aaj jaane ki zid na karo….“ As optimistic as ever we all get back dreaming, next time we meet in Pilani there will be an airport in Pilani!! Our children laugh load hearing this for the nth time after our G2Gs.

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A BITSian spouse experience HEMANT MEHTA (1978F06176) My wife Nilutpola Sharma accompanied me to the event and her experience in her words- BITS and Bytes from Jab we Met! I recently, had a rare opportunity to be the eye witness of an event that changed my opinion about men and them being unemotional. It was indeed a rare sight to see so many grown men hugging and slapping each other, forgetting their age and turning the clock back to their teen years, whistling and screaming. CEOs’ of self-made empires and Managing Directors of Multinationals, CTOs’ and COOs, with whom many may tremble even when speaking to, had gathered to relish and enjoy 40yrs “since they met” as young kids having their first life away from their nests, in this place that was their home for 5 years, their alma mater -40yrs SWM for BITS Pilani for the batch of 78. It was evident from the word go- this was not just a batch of students, but a bond that was created, a bond thicker then blood that had stood the test of time.

It turned out to be a long 8hrs road trip, with a lunch break, from Delhi to Pilani, a journey which many of them must have done semiannually, years back during their student days. Six huge buses loaded with BITSians and their spouses, having exited the traffic choked and smoke laden Delhi roads, tumbled and trundled into the narrow roads of Pilani, crowded with a variety of fruit sellers, sweet sellers and a host of other wares. It was amazing simply to see how the drivers negotiated and maneuvered their way through a mess of jam-packed roads stuffed with roadside stalls and parked bikes. The constant blare of horns and the cacophony of the markets, so familiar and endearing a sight, that you do not realize you miss, until you are in the midst of it. Sullen lipped camels gracefully trudging their way with cart loads of women in mesmerizing colors as they stare wide eyed through the thin veils covering their heads, a scene so fascinating that I forget to even take pictures , an integral part of me being me. The sand covered roads playing a weird dance sequence as the buses drove through, creating a mirage of dancing desert sand as they blew up and then settling back once momentarily, only to be gleefully blown up once again by the next passing vehicle.

The countdown of familiar sights, as the destination drew near and then finally the much-awaited view of the Majestic gate through which they had once gone, full of dreams and today as grown men who had not only achieved their dreams but helped others achieve them as well. 167 pairs of nostalgic eyes and craned necks wistfully staring at their beloved school and re-living through many a memory that may have haunted them through their lives. It was roughly a 2-day affair after 40 years ……The first eve-

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A BITSIAN SPOUSE EXPERIENCE

A BITSIAN SPOUSE EXPERIENCE

ning was a blend of delightful company and Juju’s melodies. But of course, when it comes to her, our expectations were pretty clear, it could be nothing but the best, as she charmed her way into the hearts of the cheering and dancing crowd with beautiful numbers from the yesteryears. And then the amazing philanthropic gesture, as the Bostonian Palakurthi couple, Prashanth and Juju donated a million dollars to the school they owed their union to. The food seemed straight out of some mother’s kitchen as the flavors of Rajasthani cuisine created many a fork tale in relishing mouths. The chill of the dessert night totally missed as bonfires toasted hearts already overflowing with warmth and comradery.

A walk down memory lane or a blast from the past as they called it, was the agenda of the last day as we walked through the now concrete paths of the institute with its new buildings. The changes were many, yet the 40+ years old buildings still stood strong, reminiscing the past escapades of this group who had come back to relish their roots – and share some of their untold stories and their secrets which these walls had witnessed and captured for time immemorial.

And then, there were interactions with the future generations and the faculty. The hungry ambitious ears of the students so evident from their approach. The Sunday lunch preponed to Saturday for this hungry group-a re-creation of past memories and the cultural evening as grown men jostled with the microphone to display their “cultural abilities” just as they had done in the past. The emcees had their wits sharpened as the melodies from the past rent the air ....of the same auditorium they had haunted for 5yrs, three and a half decades back. I came here a stranger, wondering whether it was the right decision to come but as the desert roads of the majestic Thar, fly past , I reminisce and realize how much more richer I return, with a gamut of new friends who were simply names for me in the past. But now I knew them, knew their stories and could call them my friends as well. And then there were also those connections that I never knew even existed with this mighty institution, family connections, work connections, state connections and even connections from my own Alma Mater.

SWM 40 simply rocked. Kudos to the organizers and the amazing participants.

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A BITSIAN SPOUSE EXPERIENCE

Editorial team Editors Ritesh Nagpal (2002A3PS416) Aparajita Roy (2007A8PS421P) Anshul Mittal (2010A2PS488P)

Design Himanshu Gupta (2012B1A4795P) Vishesh Jain (2017B5AA1158H)

Content Rahul Priyadarshi (2011C6PS813P) Sahila Agrawal (2009B5A7803P) Vaibhav Gupta (2014B3AA0707H) Abhishek Kaushik (2012A7TS056H) Arya Agarwal (2017B1A10831G) Ayush Agarwal (2011A1TS473G) Ismath (2016AAPS0037U)