Rourkela: INNOVISION-17, the three-day technical festival of the National Institute of Technology, Rourkela, came to an end on Sunday evening.
The institute's dean of students affairs S. Panigrahi said that more than 1,460 students from more than fifty institutes from all over the state and the country took part in the three-day event. Explaining the festival, Panigrahi said: "This gives all a platform to showcase their talent not only in science, technology and engineering, but also in softer topics such as literature."
NIT-Rourkela has been organising this for more than two decades.
This year, the topic of INNOVISION-17, was digital world. "We decided to have this as our theme as the world is increasingly becoming digital," said the dean.
"On one hand, we had digitisation, robotics, drone technology, automobile technology, artificial intelligence and remote control and on the other we had platform for stamp collection, coin collection, drama, literature, showcasing Odia literature and history and culture," said Panigrahi.
Two celebrity speakers from the field of technology also took part in the event. On the inaugural day, country general manager of Consumer Devices Priyadarshi Mohapatra inspired students with his speech. "There is no substitute for innovation. The more you innovate the stronger you are," said Mohapatra.
On the second day, chief executive officer and co-promoter of Reverie Language Technologies Arvind Pani narrated about his journey as an entrepreneur and said: "Innovation takes you ahead but you must have a softer sense which deals with creativity in the field of arts and literature to balance you as a human being."
Speaking about the festival, student co-ordinator Bhagwan said: "The idea to have digitalisation as the topic was to send the message that connectivity is no more a luxury but a necessity."
All the students, including those visiting from outside, were lodged in all the nine hostels of the institute.
There were various entertainment programmes as well. The famed Waris Brothers performed qawali on day one. Stand-up comedian Ankita Verma and DJ Nite and DJ Deep enthralled the students on the two other days.
