The Hindu : New Delhi News : Grooming GenX for future

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Sunday, Jan 18, 2009
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New Delhi

Grooming GenX for future

Staff Reporter

Photo: V.V. Krishnan

Proud winners: Students and a teacher of Manava Bharati India International School with their prize-winning model in the Capital on Saturday.

NEW DELHI: An unusual New Delhi railway station project designed by students of Manava Bharati India International School at Panchsheel here has won the top honours in the “Future Cities India-2020” competition organised by the Union Science and Technology Ministry and Bentley Systems.

Launched in 2006, the programme encourages students to use their design skills along with software to help prepare Indian cities for the year 2020, when it is estimated that over 50 per cent of the citizens will live in big cities. This year’s challenge centred on Indian Railways’ plans to refurbish the country’s aging railway stations into world-class facilities.

Although Union Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal could not attend the function, his message was read out at the award function here on Saturday.

“The students of Manava Bharati India International School have shown extreme foresight in their design and have proven that they fully understand the pressing need for more sustainable, high performance infrastructure to improve the lives of our citizens. By exposing young minds to engineering and design, we are grooming the next generation of infrastructure professionals and giving them an opportunity to contribute to society,” said Mr. Sibal in his message.

Asserting that the country’s future was quite bright, Bentley Empowered Careers Network’s Global Director Scott T. Lofgren said hours of hard work and perseverance had gone into the competition. “We don’t see the hard work right now but students have worked round the clock for this unique concept. India has a tight family environment so not just students even their family members have learnt a lot from this competition,” he added.

Mr. Lofgren said the students had demonstrated an unwavering desire to deliver high-quality projects aimed at sustaining India’s cities.

Members of the winning team included Harkeerat Singh, Sambit Ghosh, Ujjawal Gupta and Shwetank Chaudhry. Team leader Shwetank said it was an honour to contribute to the future of the country through this competition: “We met the challenge put before us, but all the students produced great projects so no one team had more of an advantage over the others. This makes winning all the better given the high calibre of our competitors.”

The competition attracted 15 teams representing 14 high schools. The competition was open to Class XI school children from Delhi and the NCR. The winners were awarded scholarships and their teachers also received awards.

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