IEEE GOLD Webinar: Gandhian Engineering

This webinar is scheduled for Friday, 2 October 2009 at 10:30 am Eastern and scheduled for one hour. October 2nd is also the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi.  Registration is open for this session.  The webinar will be recorded and available for review at a later date. Presented by Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, F.R.S.

The session topic, Gandhian Engineering, stems from two of the profound statements that Mahatma Gandhi made.

• Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed. 
• I would prize every invention of science made for the benefit for all.

More from less was something that should be achieved.  There was a time, when a mainframe computer occupied the size of the room.  Today a laptop sits in our lap and has a power that is far more than those old computers.   However, the laptop costs US$2000.  Can it be made it for US$100?  Maybe in the spirit of Prof. Negroponte’s one laptop per child?  As Encore’s Vinay Deshpande has demonstrated in CSIR’s New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative.  He has designed Mobilis, a mobile PC, which is getting shortly commercialized.  It has been shown that 1 percent increase in the number of internet users can boost GDP growth by 4.3%.

When it came to products and services, “high price – high performance” was reserved for the rich.  “Low price – low performance” was, of course, for the resource-poor.  The challenge is to change this price-performance envelope to say that building “low price – high performance” can be for the resource poor.  A good example of Gandhian engineering is Tata’s one lakh car, Nano, allowing millions of people to carry their families with safety and dignity under all weather conditions.

Dr. R.A. Mashelkar is the President of Global Research Alliance, a network of publicly funded R&D institutes from Asia-Pacific, Africa, Europe and USA with over 60,000 scientists.  He is the Chairman of India’s National Innovation Foundation. Various positions include:

• Director General of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), with thirty-eight laboratories and about 20,000 employees for over eleven years.
• President of Indian National Science Academy.  In the post-liberalized India, Dr. Mashelkar has played a critical role in shaping India's S&T policies.

Dr. Mashelkar is on the Board of Directors of companies such as:

• Reliance Industries Ltd.
• Tata Motors Ltd., Hindustan Unilever Ltd.
• GeneMedix Life Sciences Ltd.
• Indigene Pharmaceutifcals Ltd., ICICI Knowledge Park
• Thermax Ltd.
• Piramal Life Sciences Ltd.
• KPIT Cummins Infosystems Ltd.

He is a member of the Scientific Advisory Boards of the Microsoft (USA), Microsoft (India), VTT (Finland), etc., besides being Strategic Advisor to Alcoa (USA).

Dr. Mashelkar has received many distinguished awards and acknowledgments:

• In August 1997, Business India named Dr. Mashelkar as being among the 50 path-breakers in the post- Independent India. 
• In 1998, Dr. Mashelkar won the JRD Tata Corporate Leadership Award, the first scientist to win it. 
• In June, 1999, Business India did a cover story on Dr. Mashelkar as "CEO OF CSIR Inc.", a dream that he himself had articulated, when he took over as DG, CSIR in July 1995.
• On 16 November 2005, he received the Business Week (USA) award of ‘Stars of Asia’ at the hands of George Bush (Sr.), the former President of USA. He was the first Asian Scientist to receive it.
• The President of India honored Dr. Mashelkar with Padmashri (1991) and with Padmabhushan (2000), which are two of the highest civilian honors in recognition of his contribution to nation building.
• Dr. Mashelkar is a Fellow of Royal Society (FRS), London and Foreign Associate of US National Academy of Science and US National Academy of Engineering.
• Twenty-seven universities have honored him with honorary doctorates, which include Universities of London, Salford, Pretoria, Wisconsin and Delhi.