The UVCEian, Jan- Mar, 2015

1

Hatke A word that evokes a sense of being different, not following the norm, being out of the rat race even, and when a9ached to a person, lends to the personality a sense of following their passion devotedly.

It’s these personali?es that we dedicate this edi?on of our newsle9er too. They have made their marks across eclec?c fields – actors, sportsmen, book shop owners, ar?sts and curio-‐collectors. But they have one thing in common, a start in engineering. Years before they decided their careers, they started off as students of engineering.

“Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there's s6ll 6me to change the road you're on. And it makes me wonder ” sang Robert Plant. Passions are developed over years, honed consciously but every once in a while are also stumbled upon unexpectedly. Pursuing a passion and making a living out of it, more oKen than not, calls for immense sacrifice. In that discovery lies a future full of dedica?on. In the words of Confucius, “Choose a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life”.

In our own lives we come across this people. And we wonder if we could have made a similar choice given the right opportuni?es. Opportuni?es are not given but made. And UVCEians across fields have shown it, ?me and again, by leQng their passions and careers converge, outside engineering.

STUDENTSThe Pride -‐ Kathik Bhat Agni Kannada KavanaSAE-‐UVCE updates

FACULTYChalk & Talk -‐ Dr Vinayak Sharma

ALUMNIEle Mareya Hoovugalu 2 -‐ Kshama JayanthIt is never too late to pick up a hobby-‐Shamasundar Hallegere

THEME OF THE MONTHHatke UVCEiansBlossoms -‐ The book storeInterview -‐ Kamala Raghunath

REGULAR COLUMNSQuizCareer Corner

UVCE FOUNDATION SCHOLARSHIPUPDATE -‐ Scholarship Award 2014

CONTENTS

The UVCEianVoice of the UVCE Community | Quarterly Newsletter

Volume 2, No 1 Jan-Mar, 2015

The Pride

2 The UVCEian | Voice of the UVCE Community | Jan-Mar, 2015

Push me into the battle field,I wanna fight without any shield.Drop me into the ocean of tides,I wanna swim against the riddles.

Because I cant stay like this anymore,I wanna triumph in war for more.

Tell them that I gave my today,For their better future day.It makes me feel proud innermost ,And this is What i aspire the most.

I wanna stand tall with the Spirit,No matter what it makes me Brit .I wanna march towards enemies troopTo turn them into ashes down.

When I hear the sounds of bang bang,I wanna timidly fight with my gang.We will dedicate our flesh for this Soil,This is what we The Pride wants to Toil.

I will never quit and accept defeatVictory should fall my Nation's feet.Until then will never let my Nation's head down,Will give my country Victory's Crown.

Don't mourn if I fade away,Celebrate that at least i shined away.I wanna summon up my NationTo rejoice It's up coming incarnation

Push me into the battle field,I wanna fight without any shield.Drop me into the ocean of tides,I wanna swim against the riddles.

Because I cant stay like this anymore,I wanna triumph in war for more.

SAE-UVCE UPDATES

TEAM UVCE FOUNDATION REPORTS:Last March few Mechanical students approached UVCE FOUNDATION for funding so that they can par6cipate in Na6onal Go Kart racing.

We offered them a challenge where we said we will pay the registra6on fee of Rs. 13k and if they qualify in the preliminary round we will give them an addi6onal Rs. 15K and rest they have to raise on their own to par6cipate in the final round .

The SAE members took up the challenge, did a fabulous job star6ng from design to analysis to the final build up of the Kart to par6cipate in the na6onal event. In addi6on they raised the remaining Rs. 52K from other founda6ons

They stood sixth out of the 90 colleges that par6cipated. Here is an ar6cle about their finish in na6onals.

The Pride - A Poem

Karthik Bhat AgniECE, IV Semester

Kannada Kavana

Arun Kumar LMechanical, VI Semester

Chalk and Talk


Chalk and Talk

Prof. Krishna Vinayak SharmaDept. of Mechanical Engineering, UVCE

The News Year was navigated quite safely this year in Bangalore. There were fewer traffic deaths.

December 31st is celebrated among the Chris?an Community as their New Year’s Day. It is also some?mes called as Hogmanay (the last day of the year), and I suspect it might be a word of Cel?c origin. It is usually accompanied by a visit to the Church. The evenings are usually reserved for quiet cocktails and dinner with family and friends. It is more oKen than not, a ?me when old friends get together and think of the days gone by and the friends who have leK them. AKer all it is a celebra?on of the passage of ?me. A ?me to think, ruminate and ponder upon the impermanence of the human existence. Nostalgia coupled with the warm aKerglow of Christmas and perhaps thanksgiving. The celebra?on part, I think comes from spending ?me with family and friends. Then why do we bring so much of the “Kanji Pingi” element into these quiet celebra?ons. Usually, wild hordes roam the roads targe?ng ladies, screaming whistling ?ll

their lungs deflate, doing wheelies and trying to ride on road medians rather than the road and stretching the police force. Even if the party has to be fun and boisterous can it not be done in the privacy of houses or restaurants? Alcohol is drunk and not nursed, with the Gamma GT Liver Func?on Test, which is specific to alcohol, climbing into the 300s the day aKer. Loud music is played, food is consumed, food is brought back again through the same route. However all this is in the privacy of the house, restaurant etc., causing no nuisance to the general public.

For me, New Year’s Eve is a ?me to think about Robbie Burns (Robert Burns) who lived in the 1700’s and is widely regarded as Scotland’s Na?onal Poet. The reason is Auld Lang Syne, a beau?ful poem which has Nostalgia printed all over it in capitals. It is equally beau?ful to hear it, either in its instrument avatar or when sung. I have liked the version sung by Susan Boyle.Do listen to it at h9ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rCZduGdax8) or the Rod Stewart version at (h9ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuczsqBkZBI). The song with the lyrics of Brown is available at (h9ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xUF2ZPi7OM ). The last link song sung by Suely Hinds has the lyrics. The song when played by the ScoQsh with their bagpipes is my favourite in its instrument avatar. However it sounds best when it is sung in the ScoQsh accent. If you are lucky to be in Scotland, I would suggest a trip to Burns country, which is Ayrshire, Arran and Dumfries where he passed away and is also probably interned. All informa?on is available from the Visit Scotland Site on the internet. I have copied a nice simple picture of the place where Robbie Burns used to pen his poems from this website, below. The room is simple, sturdy and

beau?ful. No?ce the wri?ng material of those ?mes the flowers. Good place. I like it, I like it (with apologies to Upendra).

The other event associated with the New Year was the Charlie Hebdo incident. It does set off a lot of ques?ons. Where does freedom of speech start and where does it end? Or does it end at all? Or should it end at all? Can anybody speak, write, paint and lampoon to any extent. Will there be retribu?on from offended par?es quite disprop

or?onate to the perceived insult .Who is to fix what is dispropor?onate and what is propor?onate. How can you quan?fy emo?ons? Put a number that can be measured, compared and assigned for acceptance or non-‐acceptance as a standard for propor?onate retribu?on and dispropor?onate retribu?on. Much like Go-‐No Go gauges in Quality Control. What do the social scien?st, religious theologians, writers, liberal intellectuals and neo liberals have to say? Do they say the something? Is there consensus? If not, what then? Aren’t you glad that you are an engineer/scien?st trying to solve a Conformal Mapping problem or just trying to put a man on Mars rather than grappling with such horrendous problems (I was just making an understatement,ok. No need for any engineer or scien?st to get antsy and come out with painstaking comparisons with social sciences and math.) However, seriously Newton’s 3rd Law which states that ac?on and reac?on are equal and opposite seems to work only in macro engineering. In Social Sciences and among humans the reac?on may be opposite but definitely NOT equal. It is at best, wildly unpredictable.

Finally, did you buy the extra rich plum cake at Koshy’s which is around only in December? Try it the next ?me. It is worth it. It is amazingly rich in fruits, plums and rum. Bye for now, folks. Enjoy the onset of spring and wait for the first spring rains.

(The views expressed in this work are the personal views of the author. They do not represent the views of UVCE or Bangalore University or any other organiza>on.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rCZduGdax8






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuczsqBkZBI




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xUF2ZPi7OM%20






Ella Mareya Hoogalu


It is never too late to pick up a hobby


As I walk down the memory lane, several pictures from my past flash past my eyes. Some of them from that collage of pictures

stand out dis?nctly and top on the list are all those that shaped me and laid a founda?on

upon which I stand today with my head held high. The brightest of those pictures are those days I spent as a student at University

Visvesvaraya College of Engineering, the premier ins?tute that has shaped the lives of

countless number of students over the years.

Composed then was a song called “State Of frenzy”, expressing my emo?onal state which

was sung beau?fully by a professional singer/composer called Thomas Regin from Denmark

whom I met on a music forum. We just had fun in our respec?ve home studios and that song was the right tonic to enthuse me to go further.

Here is the link to the song. h9ps://app.box.com/shared/m2pkmi4rkd

Meanwhi le I had estab l i shed myse l f professionally at Merrill Lynch and was soon leading some of the stressful soKware

development projects. One of the greatest benefits out of all the stress though was that I

needed to relax over the weekends and rejuvenate myself for the week ahead. I came up with a series of songs for stress relief and

posted them on youtube. One of those songs called “Song of nature -‐ An ethnic song” that I

composed has now crossed 100,000 views on youtube. For some reason that is beyond me, this song seems to beThose nostalgic memories

take me back to the year 1983, when I stepped into UVCE as a freshman, not knowing what

was ahead of me. UVCE with its excellent faculty a9racted some of the brightest students and I felt honored to be a part of this great

ins?tute. I fondly remember all the new

friendships that I acquired some of them

for life, our strolls through Cubbon Park during leisure ?me, our smithy and

foundry workshops, our daily bus rides to the Jnanabharathi campus and all the gossip at the cafeteria. There was one

thing that was missing though. In the pursuit of academic excellence, I had

absolutely nothing to show in terms of a crea?ve hobby. I had no training in music or any other fine art and crea?vity was

completely non-‐existent in my life. It is aKer I graduated that I realized how

boring and monotonous my life had become, but really without any kind of formal training, I was going nowhere

crea?vely.

My first job was as a Scien?fic Officer at

BARC and that is probably where I came to terms with my unhappiness and the growing desire to pick up a hobby. I

remember picking up a small keyboard without any clue on how to play it, but I

had to start somewhere. I loved listening to kannada bhavageethes and Pandit Bhimsen Joshi’s Hindustani music and

music was an obvious choice. I was terrible at music and I knew it was late,

but I was determined to defy my inner fears and that was a significant win. A contented mind is a con?nuous feast and

I knew that to achieve some kind of sanity in my life, I had to make an

a9empt to ignite a crea?ve spark in me.

I was around 29 when I put my apprehensions aside and started learning

Hindustani music from a teacher. I learnt Hindustani music for about 2 years

and then my professional life took an unexpected turn. I resigned my job as a

scien?fic officer and took up an

assignment in Bangalore as a soKware Analyst at a leading CAD/CAM

company. I had to again put my music

on hold as I was chasing the “mad IT rush” and had to learn all the emerging

technologies so that I was not leK behind professionally. I now had a family to support and the demands of

IT industry meant that I was stressed and unhappy once again.

Again, yet another twist happened in my career. I moved to the United States in pursuit of soKware

development career and now as an immigrant, the next two years were

lost trying to se9le down in an alien country post the dot com bubble burst that saw the downfall of many big

companies worldwide. Yet again, music had taken a backseat and I was

helpless about it. I was also terribly homesick worrying about my parents that I had leK behind. It was during

that ?me when I bought my first professional Keyboard, a Yamaha Mo?f

that I truly cherish. The very first song I wrote and gaining popularity in the Philippines.

h9ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdOQ538PRkU

It is never too late to pick up a hobby

Shamasundar HallegereCIvil Engineering, Batch of 1987

https://app.box.com/shared/m2pkmi4rkd




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdOQ538PRkU




QUiz


QUIZ-TRON

Suresh ChivukulaE&C, Batch of 2002

IBM , Singapore

My latest and the biggest venture of all so far is a kannada

album called “Navyataranga”, a light fusion folk album that draws inspira?on from the tradi?onal Indian Hindustani

music combined with a ?nge of contemporary western rhythms. In this album I have composed and directed music for nine kannada janapada songs set to my own

tune and sung by some of the most talented singers from Karnataka, such as Ajay warriar, Divya Raghavan and

Sunitha S. It was a great learning experience and I have received posi?ve feedback from Kannadigas who have had access to the album.

h9ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-‐exOqF9LKU

Ques>ons

1. HAL 9000 in Arthur C Clarke’s Space Odyssey series is the antagonist sen?ent computer. HAL stands for ‘Heuris?cally programmed Algorithmic’. Though denied by Clarke, what was supposedly the other inspira?on for the acronym?

2. Connect invisible braces, ear thermometers and scratch-‐resistant lenses.

3. In its original form it is made of an alloy of 90 % pla?num and 10 % iridium. It is a cylinder with height and diameter of about 39 mm. What is the relevance of this object?

4. Éclair, Jelly Bean, Donut and Cupcake are sinfully calorific confec?onaries. They have one other common connect. Name it.

I am no Mano Murthy and I don’t aspire to be one. I know my limita?ons. I

am somebody driven by passion than any big talent, but I can at least draw inspira?on from the fact that I have tried to make a difference in my life.

Hobbies enhance our quality of life, renew our mind, good for the soul and improve our effec?veness and personality. The key to happiness in life is to pursue what you are passionate about. It is not important that we become

famous. It is a myth that crea?vity is bestowed upon a chosen few. We all have something inherent in us and it is never late to discover ourselves.

Finally, Educa?on and stability in life is extremely important for us to freely pursue our passions. I am indebted to all the teachers and mentors at UVCE for what I am today and making my dreams possible.

Happy new year to you!

5. This material synthesized by DuPont Research Labs is named aKer the first le9ers of 2 major ci?es either side of the Atlan?c. What is the material?

6. “Mr. Watson -‐ Come here -‐ I want to see you”. What is the significance of these words?

7. What is the full form of the free soKware GNU, ini?ated by the Free SoKware Founda?on?

8. This English word is derived from La?n ‘ingenium’ meaning cleverness. What is the word?

9. Ex-‐voto, dijes and promesas are some of the other names for the same term – religious folk charms tradi?onally used for healing purposes in Mexico. What is the UVCE connect to it?

10.Connect these pairs: Flood protec?on & Hyderabad, Vishakhapatnam & sea erosion protec?on, Cauvery River & damming, Pune’s Khadakvasala reservoir & weir water floodgates. Hint: Associated with UVCE

Answers

1. HAL is a one-‐le9er shiK from IBM. Clarke was rumored to have taken a crack at the esteemed ins?tu?on by naming the antagonist of his series as HAL

2. All the products were first created or commissioned by NASA for the American space programme

3. IPK or the Interna?onal Prototype of the Kilogram – reference standard to measure Kilogram

4. Versions of the Android OS, but not in a chronological order

5. Nylon from New York and London 6. First words spoken over a telephone. Graham Bell speaking to his assistant Watson

7. GNU is a recursive acronym which stands for GNU’s Not Unix

8. Engineer 9. Milagro – our college annual fest :) 10.Sir MV was instrumental for each of the pairs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-exOqF9LKU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-exOqF9LKU

Aishwarya


Who cares if you are black or white,Who cares if you are tall or short,Who cares if you rich or poor,Who cares if you are from the east or the west, north or the south,When I cause disasters, I don’t cause based on any of the above,Nor do I discriminate when I give you the best of me…Then why so many differences among my inhabitants..Earth-‐Aishwarya.G.M.

Born in the town of Denkanikotai and being a na?ve of a village called Kalkeri both being the most rural part of Tamil Nadu, when I reckon the journey from the first school that I went to and the current posi?on that I hold quiet fascinates me. My first school, the simplest of schools that one can find, had classes under a shamiyana(tent), where there was a so called black board which would waver every ?me the wind blew and the grass would poke so much that I had got punished a number of ?mes for the amount I used to fidget. It was my mother’s will and her efforts to put me into a school which had an English base that got me to the city. For this shestruggled and performed all the needs that were demanded and finally succeeded. It was like a great war with tremendous amount of lessons to my young mind which I wouldn’t have learnt had it been a smooth sailing. I was then admi9ed to Baldwin Girls’ High School in Bangalore. Thus began my journey to become the kind of person I am today and the first female engineer from my hometown.For the kind of background I came, it remained an enduring passion to pursue a degree related to computer science for a really long ?me un?l I

was given a chance finally. When my career started in University Visveswaraya College Of Engineering (UVCE), I was exposed to simula?ng academic environment, which helped me improve my problem solving skills and analy?cal ability. I began to gain interest at a slower pace ini?ally and then when I started doing projects in various fields like database management systems, networks, file structures, system soKware and computer graphics, I began to see things from a different perspec?ve. My efforts at UVCE helped me crack the campus interview in three companies and finally I placed myself at Oracle. A one year’s experience at Oracle helped me understand problems from a real world’s perspec?ve and usability. Apart from working with the real world scenarios, I learnt new concepts like JSP, JavaScript, MVC architecture, struts and JDBC during my training courses at Oracle. I believe that my undergraduate and corporate experience has groomed me with a strong founda?on to pursue a research oriented career in computer.

Some?mes God gives us extra powers just to see how well we make use of his blessings. It was in the year 2000, when my mother was struggling with the already present issues, a teacher of mine discovered that I was blessed with athle?c talent. When approached by my teacher my mother, without hesita?on, agreed to put me to coaching classes for athle?cs provided I fared well in both academics and the spor?ng field. Star?ng from 2003 I went on to win as many as 34 na?onal medals in various athle?c events. I went on to represent India at the Commonwealth Youth Games, Asian Junior Athle?cs

Championships and Asian Indoor Senior Athle?c Championships in the year 2012. From 2001 when I started my spor?ng career ?ll today as I write this personal essay I have been performing the balancing act of managing academics and sports even while in the soKware industry. For the 6 to 7 hours of training ?me I spent, with school followed by college in the between-‐hours for 14 years earned me the ?tle of All Rounder twice, the Best Sportsperson-‐ 2008 by the Karnataka Olympic Associa?on and a gold medal for the same from Bangalore University. There is more meaning to achievement when you can influence a few of people around you. In a society where hardly any engineers are pursuing another profession like sports or a sportsperson pursuing a course such as engineering, I was excep?onally happy that I was able to influence a number of kids to take up sports along with their educa?on. The feeling of represen?ng ones country at the interna?onal level is some joy which has no bounds.

My three years of experience as a leader in high school, combined with my sports and literary ac?vi?es has taught me the leadership quali?es, coordina?on ability, team spirit and organiza?onal skills. These have given me a good base to go on and organize various technical fests like Inspiron, Impetus and cultural fests like Milagro and provided me with the ability to be a part of and also organize various charitable events that help tackle problems like hemophilia and HIV in the society by bringing awareness among the people. It gives me tremendous amount of confidence, mo?va?on, dedica?on and strength to undertake further journey towards progress and commit myself to helping many children who can shine but are not able to due to varied circumstances, through educa?on and sports.

Further I feel that a li9le amount of courage can produce a force mul?plying effect in young minds like the one effort of my mother to put me into a school I could have not imagined. This will definitely create a chain reac?on amongst people who have had such an arduous journey to support underprivileged children in future towards development.

The Joyful Leap

Aishwarya G.M. Batch of 2013, ISEOracle, Bangalore

Hatke


Batch Name Profession

1975 Mano Murthy Leading music director, Sandalwood, Kannada Film Industry; Co-‐-‐founder of 3 startups in Networking, based out of CA, USA

1987 Ramesh Arvind Actor, Sandalwood, Kannada Film Industry

1980 Sunil Abraham Athlete, represented India in 1982 Asian Games, Delhi; Founder and pioneer of SURE Athle?c Movement, since 1987

1980 T Venkat Vardhan Entrepreneur & Co-‐founder, DNA Networks Private Ltd., Event management company responsible for hos?ng Rolling Stones, Sir Elton John, Roger Waters among others in India

1984 Kamala Raghunath Entrepreneur & Founder, GiKLinks Ltd, corporate giKing company.

1999 Meghana Narayan Women's swimming relay team, 2x400m freestyle, 13th Asian Games, Bangkok, 1998; Na?onal 100, 200 Mtr fly record holder, 1998; Rhodes Scholar, 2000

2002 Arvind Bhat Badminton Na?onal Champion, 2008, 2011; Winner, German Open, 2014

2002 Thomas Jacob Entrepreneur & Co-‐founder, Celebrate Life, Wellness & Beauty Spa

2007 Ananth Mallya Entrepreneur & Founder, Quantech Origin, professional cosul?ng services and trianer.

1999 Mayi Gowda Entrepreneur & Founder, Blossoms Book House, Bangalore

A dras?c career change aKer earning a professional degree ? Or s?ll worse, aKer reaching midlife?

Many students who take up engineering out of societal or family expecta?ons (or even a misguided sense of their own capabili?es), end up facing this dilemma midway: What am I doing here? Some follow their passion and call it quits even befor they complete. S?ll others con?nue ?ll they reach midlife before switching to a career that their heart desires. It is hardly easy, though!

” Do what you love and money will follow” is an oKen heard quote. When you have a full?me job and a family to sustain, though, quiQng your job to follow your passion can be daun?ng, right? If you are one of them, you are not alone :). Many people feel they have to chose between having money and doing what they love; and then there are s?ll others who take that step and find a way of doing both!

Here we present a few such UVCEians, who took the plunge to follow their passions and have made it past the finishing line of success -‐ Hatke UVCEians!

HATKE UVCEians!

Blossoms


Hi, I’m Blossoms.

Blossoms Book House if you prefer my name in full. All of you who walked through Church Street, Bangalore in the last

decade and a half, have felt my gaze. My gaze!! It’s not one to be dismissed with ease, mind you. A gaze as strong as

one of my most evil resident’s, Sauron from Tolkien’s trilogy. But my gaze hasn’t always come out from a height of 3

storeys, and a spread of 4000 sq. ft. I started out with a little more than a glance, stretching out at 90 sq. ft. on M G

Road.

Books are my bloodline, and some of them stay with me for long. Some of them hold notes from freedom fighters, like

Rabindranath Tagore, in them. Some others hold catalogue cards from my bigger brothers across the world, like the

Library of Congress, Washington. I owe my longevity and eclectic nature to one determined book lover, Mayi Gowda.

Mayi Gowda, who graduated in Electrical Engineering from UVCE, the kind

whom my ilk hold dear. Mayi Gowda, caretaker and humble surveyor of my

bloodline.

My story began as an act of inevitability. Mayi during his days at UVCE found it

a wonderful source of adversity and

camaraderie. “Let me embrace thee, sour

adversity, for wise men say it’s the wisest course”

claims one of my older residents, William

Shakespeare. Mayi, in clairvoyance little seen these days, probably heard

and took to heart, this resident’s words, thus creating me. Book sellers

setting fleeting shops by the roadside, ignited those first sparks in him.

Mayi while at UVCE, used to finish his classes by noon and rush to MG road to

set up books on the pavement. The first steps saw him borrow books from

similar pavement booksellers on KG road.

Like those country roads that meander, before an abrupt end that signals the start of a village. Mayi had academic

pursuits based in Electrical Engineering. Before completing his final year, he was sought by GE, that conglomerate with

interests as varied as Wodehouse’s Oldest Member.

Mayi did join GE and the clairvoyance aforementioned, seemed short-lived. I did not see it coming. What was really

short-lived was Mayi’s career with GE, an idea that like a badly bound book, did not sit well amongst his well-wishers.

Mayi was determined. Books were his calling, and he was glad to have known his true passion early on.

Transient as I was, I moved from MG Road to a small place in Brigade Garden, Brigade Road. I blossomed very well at

Brigade Garden to the point where I could associate myself with the phrase ‘standing place only’, usually reserved to

live performances from the protagonists in my ‘biographies, music’ section. On such occasions, Mayi would let the

customer stand in, while he stood out. Our partnership blossomed even more with success and we eventually moved

to where I currently stand, on Church Street.

With the new place and new found size, came my gaze. People from all over come looking for books new and old in

me. I cater to a large diaspora of readers. For those of you who lose your way on what needs to be done with my

children, once they are read, I leave my doors open, for you to bring them back. Which makes Mayi happy, since he

sees more of your kind and more often of you.

If it wasn’t for the man, with the longevity of a hard leather-bound and the heart of a flower, I wouldn’t be blossoming

the way I am now.

Thank you Mayi Gowda, mentor, hero and friend.

Yours Literally,

Blossoms Book House

( Blossoms Book House is a popular Book store on Church Street, started by Hatke UVCEian, Mari Gowda, Batch of 1999 ) Article by Sagar Moudgal of The UVCEian Team.

Kamala


Rajanna was encouraging enough to take me back in UVCE.

Of course, many were surprised and wondered how I could let go of the opportunity to be at Yale!

UVCEian: What other university or organiza6on have you been part of? Are there any learnings worth men6oning from these. (Any mentors).KR: Soon aKer my Engineering degree I started R.K.Industries and GiK Links. I have always been associated extensively with the Associa?on for Women Entrepreneurs of Karnataka (AWAKE). This associa?on ac?vely promotes entrepreneurship among women across the State. Through AWAKE I was ac?vely involved in other entrepreneurship agencies like FICCI and FKCCI. I was very ac?ve in AWAKE for many years ?ll I was diagnosed with an eye ailment about 8 years ago which gradually lead to vision problems. Till then I was very involved in promo?ng entrepreneurship amongst women and public by doing a lot of work at the grass root level.My mentor has always been my husband, Raghunath who is also a UVCE alumnus (from the 1982 batch of Electronics). He has been a very great support to me. He was also a tennis player; infact we met on the Tennis Court! He was with the Tata Group for a long ?me ?ll I was diagnosed with this eye condi?on, aKer which he moved in to help me with my company. This has been close to 9 years now. Given the situa?on I was in I would have closed down the company.

Ragini Hadagali of the UVCEian team had the opportunity to interview an accomplished and Hatke UVCEian -‐ Kamala Raghunath. Kamala is the founder and Managing Director, Gif Links, a corporate gifing company. We bring you the exerpts -‐

UVCEian: Tell us a bit about your childhood. Where you were born, raised and the circumstances. How has the social milieu and the schooling had an impact on you in your life?Kamala Raghunath (KR): I was born in Mangalore and did my schooling in St. Agnes ?ll the 8th Std. The grounding there was very good and the atmosphere I grew up in was sporty and there was much family bonding too. AKer the 8th Std. we moved to Bangalore and that is when I started my tryst with tennis. Good Shepherd convent and then to Mount Carmel College ?ll second PUC. Got into UVCE in the year 1979. Even at UVCE I was on the na?onal tennis circuit most of the ?me and hardly a9ended classes!! We won the inter university championship in the year 1982.

UVCEian: How was it like studying in UVCE? What aspect of your experience as a student at UVCE has been most beneficial to your career?KR: Now that’s a difficult ques?on!! I was more out of Class than in the Class! All the professors were very encouraging and helped a lot to promote me as a player. But I have one episode I have to narrate....In my third semester, I got a tennis scholarship in Yale University.I had received a full scholarship to be on the University Tennis team. Within a few months, though, I realized that I wanted to be back home. I was so homesick and decided to come back. It sure was an impulsive decision but I do not regret having taken it.Principal Dr B.C.

UVCEian: You have chosen to move away from mainstream engineering to establish your own company in a totally 'Hatke' space. Would you like to talk about the mo6va6on, challenges in doing this? What was most rewarding?KR: From the beginning, I was never interested in a 9 to 5 job as rou?nes always unnerved me.

Toying with the idea of keeping myself busy I chanced upon a project for manufacturing clocks and that's how R.K.Industries started in the year 1986. This business grew year on year and in 1989 we started GiK Links India Pvt Ltd which caters to the corporate giKing requirements of large corpora?ons.The mo?va?on to start a company of my own was of course the flexible ?me that I could have considering that I was a new "bahu".The mo?va?on to expand and grow the business came mainly because of the success I saw in the ini?al years.

UVCEian: You have led Gif Links to admirable success, not without its tough moments. What do you believe should be the fundamental focus and strengths of an entrepreneur?KR: An entrepreneur, I feel, should just work, not think of the results and concentrate on the process. I don’t believe in goals being set either. Maybe some part of it is intui?on too. When an opportunity came by, I was ready to grab it and maybe at the right ?me I did the right thing! I did not plan or think too much. One should not think a lot, then probably one cannot do what one wants to do or can do then. Going with your intui?on, doing it, at the right ?me is very important. When you are an entrepreneur you cannot dilly-‐dally. Having said that some?me things may fail and one should be ready for that too.

Hatke UVCEians

Interview

Kamala Raghunath (E&C, 1984)

MD , GiftLinks Ltd

Career Corner


UVCEian: Was there any learning from being an engineer that you apply to your current work.KR: Definitely. Today I may be in a business that does not use any engineering circuits, capacitors and stuff like that, but the power of reasoning that you develop while studying engineering helps greatly in running a business.

UVCEian: Do you have a message for the young engineers gradua6ng from UVCE?

Vivek: Hi I am currently working as tech lead in a major technology company which is quite sa6sfactory wrt almost all things from job sa6sfac6on to compensa6on to perks and recogni6on. In short, it seems a fairytale job. However, since a couple of weeks I have been bugged by a thought to have my startup.All my career of 6 years has been in a single domain but to start my venture in this domain is prac6cally not possible. How ever there are some really exci6ng ideas I have and want to explore.My ques6on at this juncture is “should I chase my new fantasy and test new waters or should I con6nue with the high flying career that I have?”

Ram: 6 years of working experience in any industry will come in handy when you do a start up. In that sense you are in the right ?meframe to follow your dream

A few things to consider and plan on before you do a start up:

-‐Do you have the domain exper?se in the area you are going to do the start up in? If not can you hire or partner to provide this exper?se.During the start up phase, have you built enough savings to take care of your personal (yours and your dependents) expenses for couple of

Career CornerCareer Counselor

Ram Vasantharam ( ’69 EE)Former Director, Intel-India

years? How do you plan to finance the start up? Do you have some of your own money to invest? Do you have a good net work of VCs or angel investors who may consider financing your project. Are you an effec?ve marketeer? This is to get funding for the project as well as sell the product down road when you have developed it. If not you need to hire or partner with someone with this exper?se. Do you know how big an opportunity is out there for the product you have in mind? What is the total market? Who are the compe?tors if any? Why is your product going to be be9er than the compe?tors? In terms of staffing: For an effec?ve start up you need content exper?se, marke?ng exper?se and finance exper?se (you may be able to contract out finance part in the beginning). If you have reasonable answers to the above (there are few more I might have missed), yes it is definitely worth pursuing your dream.

One last thing to add: don't burn any bridges. Keep in touch with your current company, your co workers, manager. In case things don't work out at the start up you should be able to get back to what you are doing today.

If you want to bounce off your ideas, please write to us at newsle9er@uvcefounda?on.org . Good luck!-‐-‐-‐-‐Anand: I will graduate in two years as a Mechanical Engineer and would like to take up Aerospace Engineering which I find is very interes?ng from the websites I have browsed through. I want to know if such opportuni?es exist in India. Should I study further or join a Company / Organiza?on where I can be trained in the field I like. Can you please suggest

companies which carry out research in Aerospace engineering?

Ram: Since it is a highly theore?cal field geQng an advanced degree (MS or PhD) in Aerospace engineering will definitely help you to advance your career.

I referred this ques?on to Professor Jaywant Arakeri at IISc. and here is his reply -‐1) Doing a Masters degree (ME,MTech, MS) in IISc or one of the IITs, which have Aero departments, is a good op?on. One would have to write GATE, the all-‐India level entrance exam. Some of the local engineering colleges have started Masters programs in aerospace, but I am not sure the quality of educa?on will be good. 2) Many private firms (TCS, QUEST, Altair) do work related to the aerospace industry, and who hire Mechanical engineering graduates. They appropriately train the hired personnel in Aero subjects for doing the required job.I suspect that there may not be much R&D ac?vity, and the work content will be more related to CAD, CFD, finite-‐element analysis.

I hope this helps.

KR: There are so many opportuni?es for young engineers now. There is a lot of IT happening but my advice for them would be to get into the manufacturing sector. No doubt IT has much scope now, but as engineers we do have sufficient informa?on of how things are done and we should get into the manufacturing sector as this is a major contributor to the Country’s economy.

Students who are inclined must definitely get into such sectors. We should also promote smaller companies and encourage students who

want to become entrepreneurs. I go to various colleges to address students I feel that only a very few students opt for being entrepreneurs. Maybe in a class of 60 just about 10 students would be interested and only one might become an entrepreneur. If they have role models then the students will aspire. Colleges should create awareness and give them the right exposure. It does not mean that the en?re class should become entrepreneurs but the students who have a spark must be encouraged to explore this op?on.

mailto:[email protected]


UVCE Foundation


The scholarship program formally began by suppor?ng 32 students in 2012. One of the scholars Lakshmi of 5th semester Civil Engineering said “I am truly grateful to UVCE founda6on for giving me the scholarship three years in a row which is giving all of us, recipients of this scholarship, a bright source of light in our lives". The criteria for selec?on were the financial need, family condi?ons and the academic merit of the candidate. The goal of the program is to have a sustained annual scholarship award for 150 students of UVCE from socio-‐economically disadvantaged backgrounds by the year 2015.

The award func?on was presided over by the Bangalore University Vice Chancellor Dr. B Thimme Gowda and the chief guest for the occasion was Sri V. R. Sudarshan, Former Deputy Chairman, Karnataka Legisla?ve Council. BV Jagadeesh, highly regarded Global entrepreneur and investor and, Chairman, UVCE Founda?on US, was the keynote speaker for the occasion. Ram Vasantharam , Chairman , Scholarship Commi9ee UVCE Founda?on US, was a guest of honour on the occassion. Apprecia?ng the response of the UVCE alumni in rising up to support the program. Jagadeesh said “It's heartening to see the generosity and overwhelming support of UVCE alumni from USA and India to give scholarships to 123 students from the poorer sec?on to whom this can make a life changing difference, and to the en?re family once the students graduate. Our hear}elt thanks to everyone who supported this cause. “

UVCE Alumni, and members Rotary Bangalore South a9ended the event in good number.

UVCE Founda6on distributed need-‐based scholarships close to Thirteen lakh Rupees to financially needy UVCE students at a

Scholarships Award Ceremony jointly hosted by UVCE Founda6on and Rotary Bangalore South on November 9th, 2014, at the Jnana

Jyothi Auditorium, Central college Campus. Into its third year, the program has seen enormous support from alumni in India and abroad. This year the Founda6on is able to give away scholarships to a record 123 students.

UVCE SCHOLARSHIPS 2014 - UPDATE AND AWARD CEREMONY REPORT


http://uvcefoundation.org In US; UVCE Foundation US, PO Box 0455, Cupertino, California – 95014, USA, Ph: +1 408 996 1022 |In India: UVCE Foundation,#17, 2nd Main, Basaveswara Layout, 2nd Stage, Chandra Layout, Bengaluru 560040, India | Ph: 0091 94482 70489.

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UVCE Foundation US is a 501 (C) organization in USA. In India, UVCE Foundation is 80G certified. Registered in 2002

Editorial Board of The UVCEian

Dr. Alice Abraham ( 1991 E&E)Ragini H S (1991 E&C) Kshama Jayanth (1991 E&E) Suresh Chivukula (2002, E&C) Sagar Moudgal (2008, Mech) Chinmayee Nagaraju ( 2008, IS)Gayathri S (2008, IS)Ravi P L ( 2002, Mech) Rakesh ( 2010, CS)

Advisors

Dr. B R Niranjan, Dr. Vinayak Sharma Professor, Dept. Civil Engg. Professor, Dept. of Mech Engg.Dr. Narendra Kumar G Dr. E G Shivakumar Professor. Department of E&C Professor, Department of EE Prof. Dilip

Professor, Department Computer Science

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The UVCEian, Jan- Mar, 2015

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Transcript of The UVCEian, Jan- Mar, 2015