(Top) The Robotic Arm, which senses the co-ordinates of objects and transfers it to a different co-ordinate; (above) a robot designed to follow complicated tracks at the Robotics exhibition at IEM

Dzyan-08, the tech festival of the Institute of Engineering & Management (IEM) was innovation at its best. Topping the list were the robotics exhibition, interactive guest lectures and mobile-based registration and fest updates, powered by Capillary Technologies.

The two-day festival was not about competition only. With no limit on the number of teams participating from a college for a single event, the idea was simple — come and have a blast! Be it the tussle between robots in a kabaddi match, finding bugs in programs, taming robots to follow a designed path or simply scoring high in games like FIFA and NFS, students turned out in huge numbers.

With close to 80 colleges making a beeline for the Salt Lake campus, one could only imagine the rush at the registration desk. But those waiting in the queues were saved by an SMS. Tying up with Capillary Technologies, a mobile-based value added services company launched by the alumnus of IIT-Kharagpur, IEM introduced SMS-based registrations for the first time, through which fest updates, schedules and other information were made available to all colleges at local SMS rates. “It was a great idea. I saw the rush at the registration desk and was in two minds. But the SMS registration made it easy — I was registered in no time,” said Vikramjit Choudhary, a second-year IT student from Jadavpur University (Salt Lake campus).

IEM also takes pride in Robotics, a self-funded exhibition of five types of robots, designed on campus. “Robotics is fun. And now IEM students are addicted to it, thanks to our teachers. They instilled the passion in us to study this field and now we can’t do without it,” said Susmita Dubey, a fourth-year IT student. Be it the cute little robots running around on toothbrush bristles, the smarty that understood visual and verbal instructions or the grid navigator that detected obstacles on a 7 X 7 grid (a first prize winner at IIT-Kharagpur in 2006) — with these exhibits, Robotics proved to be unique and enjoyable.

“It’s not about Robotics alone. IEM has a dedicated group of teachers and talented students that makes the institution what it is today,” said professor Anupam Basu of IIT-Kharagpur, who delivered a lecture on assistive technology at the fest.

Decoding Dzyan (which means mysticism), is actually easy — lots of fun and learning, now available on an SMS platform as well. And as Manish Gupta, the over-all co-ordinator puts it, for IEM, Dzyan is a step closer to success.