A Memorable Trip at IIT Kharagpur
1st September 1962 — Should I call it a ‘D’ day or the ‘B’ day as in the best day on our memory lane .When I term as our , it becomes more special than just me .Goutam Banerjee , Pradeep Bhattacharjee, Samar Roychoudhury , Amaresh Chakraborty and of course me comprise of this “our” , in the saga of memory tale. It was Saturday afternoon, prior to the last history class; we all sat to go for an excursion post our intellectual ragging sessions in IIT Kharagpur. And there by taking a break from the study pressure of one of the then most prestigious learning institute in India. All these plans started in the thirst of some excitement from our routine life. But life is not bed of roses .It was beginning of the month and most of us had no money as on these days money order or bank transfers used to take substantial time. As great ideas evolve from brain storming, so did we and found that main expenses were on three fronts i.e. travelling or commute cost, expenses on foods and hotel accommodation charges. We took our bikes/cycles to cut down on the vehicle cost, some dry food from hostel to economize food expenses and decided to have a bag packer trip of travelling during night and enjoy the day.
Just when we cruised through our financial arithmetic, the history teacher entered the class and we had to close our round table chit chat and continue post class finishes .After the class, we five musketeers decided to go to Digha beach to see the morning sunrise at sea bed along with natural beauty of sea side of Digha .I became the self declared trip leader. We were immensely excited to execute the first project of our life. With tons of excitement we happened to share our plan with our batch mates and seniors of Nehru Hall during dinner time. However we received a not so happening vibes from all since this seemed to be an unrealistic travel plan with cycle ride of 100 + km single way and then return on the same day. De motivation prevailed when friends tried to refrain us from chasing this superficial trip owing to reasons of safety during night travel .Besides nobody in the history of IIT Kharagpur had made such a long journey by cycle for excursion. But we thought of writing history and erasing dilemmas as I always wanted to do something offbeat, be the first one throughout the life.
Started journey at 7:30 PM with best wishes from all seniors and friends with their enthusiastic waving and clapping. Among us there were four smokers and me a non smoker. Initially frequent stoppages for smoking were hampering our travelling speed, so we finally fixed that group could stop for smoking only after 10 Km travel. All followed the rule of smoking to continue with the journey seamlessly. We started with bright lights in all cycles, but with times the torch batteries faded and became zero one by one. We had no alternative except to be guided by lights of trucks/cars driven on the roads in the dark black night. We reached our destination at early morning and started to have unlimited fun…The sunlight at Digha beach still resonates the beauty and fun we had. It was truly an enticing journey and when reached back hostel, we paved path of an unexplored arena of cycling to Digha. Trend well set for upcoming batches.
When I look back now, in my 50 years of Engineering and Management life, I have always done crazy things as I always embraced multiple first things as challenges. The present being no exception, I as CEO of Techno India University and Techno India Group of Kolkata, under leadership of Dr. Gautam Roychoudhury, our Chancellor and Chairman, are stepping to bring radical changes in Indian Education System. This will be followed by a sea change in Employment field. Our motto is “Earn while you learn” and no one in the country has to leave higher education on financial ground. Techno India Group is going to form a trust which will bear the entire education cost of the students for their education in the field of Engineering, Medical science, graduate and post graduate level or PHD level. Only the students have to give three undertaking:
a) They will serve to their native village/town
b) To take care of their parents
c) To bear cost of educating one student after employment.
Concluding on the note to serve such cases where I need support from all of you, if you are aware of such students, kindly ask them to contact TIU or me. Techno India Group does not believe in producing graduate / post graduate Engineers or Management wizards as job seekers but want them to be jobs creators. With this vision of our Chancellor, the academic courses are sandwich of practical and theoretical with more weightage to on job training of students.
~Mr Narayan Chandra Dutta
Mechanical — 1967 Batch
Nehru & RK Hall
