A two day e-Yantra Symposium (eYS-2016) was organized by e-Yantra Lab Setup Initiative (eLSI) project team, at IIT Bombay on 11th and 12th April, 2016. The symposium was organized under the e-Yantra Project and under the supervision of Prof. Kavi Arya, Principal Investigator, e-Yantra Project. The objective of this symposium was to bring together colleges which have established e-Yantra labs through the e-Yantra Lab Setup Initiative (eLSI) for discussions and seminars on how to turn these labs into Innovation Hubs. The symposium also provides a platform for showcasing student/research projects that were executed in the e-Yantra labs at these colleges. Around 100 Faculty members and 70 students of different Engineering colleges from 17 regions across India participated in the e-Yantra Symposium.

Assistant Prof. Krishanu Kundu along with two students namely Mr. Piyush Chandran (17863) & Mr. Amandeep Singh (17830) from Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department of Dronacharya College of Engineering, Gurgaon attended the Symposium.

Day One started with registration of the participants. In the inaugural session Dr. Krishna Lala, Project Manager briefed participants about the mission and vision of the symposium. She added that the idea is to incorporate embedded system and robotics into engineering education with the objective of engaging students and teachers through exciting hands-on application of engineering principles. The welcome note was addressed by Prof. P.V.Balaji, Associate Dean R& D, IIT Bombay. The next speaker of the day was Prof. Kavi Arya, Principal Investigator, e-Yantra Project, IIT Bombay. In his speech Prof. Kavi Arya discussed on the topic “Innovation & Entrepreneurship”. He described the slogan Make In India as Make For India. Prof. Arya focussed on the matter that it is high time to create a manufacturing friendly eco-system for entrepreneurs and e-Yantra has provided the platform to equip the students the future entrepreneurs, with self confidence & skills.

The session preceded by the valuable speech of Prof. Krithi Ramamritham CSE Dept. & Head, CUSE (Centre for Urban Sc. & Engg.) on the topic named “Searching for a Research Topic: it can be fun”. The next speaker of the day was Indian Scientist & Padma Shri awardee Dr. Subbiah Arunan. Dr. Arnan discussed on the Indias’s Mangalyan Mission , Case study on ISRO’s innovation.

Lt. Gen. AV Subramanian (Retd.) headed the session on the topic “How do we ‘Make in India’ for India’s defence requirements?” He discussed about the challenges for the armed force and urged the e-Yantra family to innovate new ideas for night vision problems. This was followed by a panel discussion on the topic “How might we evolve e-Yantra labs into Innovation Hubs?”

The panellists were Prof. S.S. Mantha (Ex- Chairman, AICTE), Mr. Ajay Nanavati (Chair, Innovation & Entrepreneurship Cell, CII) & Lt Gen A.V. Subramanian (retd./ Formerly of Defence Procurement).

The main outcome of the discussion was “Key to Innovation is to share knowledge” and e-Yantra firmly follows the concept of sharing skills of robotics and embedded systems.

Later half of the session was all about the selected presentations from e-Yantra Ideas competition. The e-Yantra Ideas competition was started with 181 teams from 120 eLSI colleges, among which 44 teams implemented their ideas into projects and finally 11 teams were shortlisted for final round. Among 11 teams, team from Yadavrao Tasgaonkar Institute of Engineering & Technology with the project titled “Automated Security system”, team from Vivekanand Education Society Institute of Technology with project titled “Pothole Management System using Image Processing & Geo tagging”, team from Ajay Kumar Garg Engineering College with project title “Unmanned Train With Automatic Signalling In Indian Railways”, team from Pune Institute Of Computer Technology with project titled “Landmine Detecting Rover” and team from Rodrigues Institute of Technology with project titled “Autonomous Shopping Robot” demonstrated their ideas among the audience.

Day Two started with the valuable thoughts of Dr. Saraswathi Krithivasan, Senior Project Manager, e-Yantra Project. Later on Prof V. Ramgopal, Head Nanotechnology Centre IIT Bombay, discussed on the topic “How to Get Research out of the Lab into the Real World?” The session followed by a panel discussion on the topic “How to use e-Yantra Labs in Hands-on Learning” with a panel of faculties from regional eLSI colleges, moderated by Dr. Krishna Lala, Senior Project Manager, e-Yantra Project.

The two day symposium came to an end with the award ceremony for the e-Yantra Task Based Training & e-Yantra Ideas competition. The Symposium was indeed an interactive session and a fruitful platform for gaining knowledge.