SMVDU Katra: Dr. S. H. Alsamhi, from the Aerospace School, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China delivered an expert talk on “Greening Internet of things and Smart Everything with A Green-Environment Life” in the Dept. of Electronics and Communication Engineering, Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University on 28th Aug. The lecture highlighted the importance of Green Internet of Things (IoT) which reduces the power consumption, conserve resources, and reduce carbon emission. Enabling technologies and techniques were discussed which can be efficiently deployed to achieve a green IoT. An essential contribution of this lecture is to conduct an in-depth study of the existing potential work in Green IoT to deliver environmentally smart solutions. The awareness of the same among graduate, post-graduate and PhD research students needs to be generated. The expert lecture was organized by Dr. Sachin Kumar Gupta Assistant Professor and Lecture Coordinator DoECE and Dr. K. R. Jha Associate Professor and Head DoECE. Dr. Sumeet Gupta, dean Academic Affairs presented a vote of thanks.

SMVDU Katra Aug. 12: Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University organized its 5th Annual Alumni Meet on 12thAugust, 2017 in their campus at Kakryal, Katra. The main motive of this alumni meet was to create a tether of the alumni with the alma mater and recognize the achievements as well as exalt and applaud the milestone of the potential graduates. The one-day meet observed the participation of over a hundred alumni from B. Arch., MBA, M.Sc., PhD, B.Tech., M.Tech. and M.A. from different parts of the country. The alumni meet focused on giving a global experience to their students and to renew the bond between the passed out students, the current students as well as the faculty. The alumni of SMVDU who had been at distinguished positions and experience from diverse fields included, industries, electronics, banking, academics, entrepreneurship and others participated in the event with great zeal.

The event commenced with a brief welcome address by the Dr. V. K. Tripathi, who conducted an interesting interactive session; where in the alumni members of SMVDU interacted with the students on their experiences and answering their queries. Mr. Gaurav said that SMVDU is a place which is at par with any national level institution and its students who make the difference. Mr. Dishant Bhatia an architect entrepreneur and Sujat Mahajan, MBA called upon the students to take the best of opportunities to nurture the idea at a place like SMVDU. Akshita Khajuria, Achyut Sharma and Sahil Bhargotra provided the motivation and answered the career queries of the students. Mr. Sameer Sengar, final year student introduced the beta version of the alumni website. The evening with alumni witnessed colorful cultural performances by the alumni and the board of cultural activities. The performances included including dances, poetry session & music performances by the students followed by a gala facilitation ceremony.

Vice Chancellor Dr. Sanjeev Jain expressed his contentment & delectation over the initiative of connecting the institution with the vast alumni network of SMVDU. He highlighted the contributions made by the alumni in making SMVDU a well renowned and reputed institute. Prof. V.K. Bhat in his address welcomed the alumni and said that it is the opportunity to relive the education and create a bond with society with a meaningful contribution. Dr. Saurabh, the faculty in-Charge Alumni Affairs at SMVDU delivered the vote of thanks to the all the participating alumni members and said that it is the alumni that sustains the brand of SMVDU. He thanked the entire alumni faculty and staffs as well as the members of alumni meet event organizing committee in making the event successful. The event was concluded by the gala dinner in the evening which was graced by the faculty, Deans, Heads of various department, alumni members and students.

SMVDU Katra: A 5-day workshop organized by Human Resource Development Centre (HRDC) SMVDU on ‘Office Management & Skills Development’ for Junior Assistants from 21st to 25th August, 2017 concludes at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University. Numerous Resource Persons delivered the technical lectures in this workshop. The workshop proved to be a good experience for Junior Assistants as it updates them on themes like stress management, personality assessment, communication skills, written communication and official correspondence.

The closing ceremony of the workshop began with the welcome address by Director HRDC. Resource Persons and participants were awarded certificates by Prof. D. Mukhopadhyay, Director HRDC and Dean Faculty of Management. The ceremony ended with a vote of thanks by Dr. Deepak Jain, Assistant Director, HRDC and Course Coordinator. Mr. Samir Vohra, Technical Officer, HRDC & AR Academic, Resource Persons and participants were present on the occasion.

SMVDU Katra: National Service Scheme (NSS) at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University organized Orientation Program for all the new Undergraduate students. Around 150 students participated in the event. The programme was coordinated by Mr. Sumanta S. Sharma, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Philosophy & Culture and Program Coordinator NSS, where he informed and explained the motto of NSS along with its objectives, requirements and purpose.

During the session the participating students were also told about various major activities like Plantation drive, VISAKA, Swacch Bharat Abhiyaan, Beti- Bachao Beti-Padhao Abhiyan, Social awareness rallies, etc. along with the list of events to be conducted in the ongoing semester. Students were also encouraged to propose events from their own to be included as NSS activities. They were also told about Vikalp, which is University’s novel initiative to educate poor children from nearby areas. In the end, queries and doubts of new students were taken in the question-answer session which was followed by a general discussion. It is pertinent to mention here that SMVDU has made it mandatory for the newly admitted UG students to render 40 hours of service towards NSS activities in order to sensitize them towards social concerns and to instill in them a sense of selfless service to society.

SMVDU Katra: A 5-day part-time workshop for Junior Assistants on ‘Office Management & Skills Development’ was started by Human Resource Development Centre (HRDC) of Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University. The workshop will continue from 21 to 25 August 2017. It was formally inaugurated by Prof. V. K. Bhat Dean Faculty of Sciences and Registrar of the University, who in his inaugural address stated the importance of this workshop and wished the targeted audience a fruitful training. Prof. D. Mukhopadhyay, Director HRDC and Dean Faculty of Management while speaking on the occasion emphasized on conducting such events on regular basis as enhancement of skills and continuous value additions are the need of the hour. Other dignitaries who were present and spoke during this event were Dr. Deepak Jain, Assistant Director HRDC and Course Coordinator and Mr. Samir Vohra, Technical Officer HRDC and Assistant Registrar Academic. Dr. Deepak Jain also presented the Vote of Thanks.

SMVDU Katra: As the country is celebrating 75th year of the Quit India Movement that started on 9th Aug. 1942, the Ministry of Human Resource Development GOI and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) announces a series of activities in higher education institutions to commemorate the great event and sacrifices of revered freedom fighters. As per the directive, a pledge-taking ceremony was organized in which all faculty and students participated in their respective classes at 9.30am yesterday.

A number of activities will be undertaken to sensitize the students towards the freedom struggle and Quit India Movement which led to securing of India’s Independence. A Panel Discussion on the theme assigned ‘New India Manthan’ will be organized by Mind-Meet Forum, emphasis will be given on Prime Minister’s endeavour to have a terrorism-free, caste-free, un-cleanliness-free, poverty-free society and that the same can be actualized with the help of society. Board of Cultural Activities (BCA) will be organizing debate and declamation competitions, quiz competition and essay-writing competition on the theme. The series of activities will conclude on 30th August.

SMVDU Katra: Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University celebrates her 14th foundation day with the cultural extravaganza by students and family kids on 19th August in Matrika auditorium. On the same day in the year 2004, Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam inaugurated the University and conducted the first teaching class with students of computer science and MBA. The University turns 13 year old now and in this shorter span of time it has witnessed rapid pace of growth in terms of infrastructure, academics and students achievements due to able leadership of Chancellors and Vice Chancellor, hardworking faculty, dedicated staff, meritorious students, motivated research scholars and caring alumni.

The students of the University presented a cultural show in which Akriti Panotra, Tawfeeq Banday, Vivek Kumar, Raghav Gupta, Anshul, Anmol, Urvashi, Nikhil, Navleen, Mehul, Palak, Sanchit, Swantika, Ishani Lal and Vaishnavi presented their cultural items. The show included singing, instrumental and dance performances, poetry, classical singing etc. Dr. V.K. Tripathi President Board of Cultural Activities welcomed the guests and presented a recollection of Dr. Kalam’s first class conducted on the date 13 years back. Vice Chancellor Prof. Sanjeev Jain, Registrar Prof. V. K. Bhat, Dean of Students Dr. Yugal Khajuria conveyed their best wishes. Dr. Rakesh Kumar Vice President Board of Cultural Activities, Dr. Narendra Bairwa, Dr. Saurabh and many other faculty members, staff members, members from the families and all the students were present. Khushboo Julfi, Amreen Qadir and Manglam Mishra conducted the show. Mr. Opinder Singh Sidhu, Gurman Saan Singh, Abhishek Mahajan, Arjun Singh, Aman and Sandeep managed the logistics.

SMVDU Katra: Team Mechanix of the Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Katra has emerged as the only team to qualify for the next stage from the Jammu & Kashmir and ranked under 50 among new teams in the SAE BAJA 2018. The team consisting of 25 members mentored by Dr. R.K. Mishra Associate Professor and Er. Mir Irfan-Ul-Haq Asst. Professor, was represented by five members Shivam Yadav (Captain, Steering Design), Abhishek Kumar (Vice Captain, Roll Cage Design), Abhishek Shukla (Manager, Suspension Design), Manish Kumar Singh (Transmission and Tyres) and Aditij Tandon (Core Team Member) for the Virtual Round in Chandigarh. BAJA SAE INDIA gives engineering students an opportunity to showcase skills in designing four wheeled, single seater, all terrain automobiles. These vehicles are evaluated on the basis of Static, Dynamic and Durability events taking into consideration design, cost, presentation, build quality, innovation, acceleration, maneuverability, hill climb, suspension, traction and endurance. Promoted by Mahindra and Mahindra, BAJA SAE INDIA is the biggest automobile national-level intercollegiate event which takes place every year since 2007. This year, the organizer’s received 388 entries, out of which 180 college have been shortlisted for conventional Baja and E-Baja.

The two day event held at Chitkara University, Chandigarh dated 13th & 14th July the registered teams were scrutinized for their knowledge and capability to participate successfully in the main event to be held in 2018. In which Team Mechanix obtained 149 marks out of 200 which can be elaborated as 62.4/100 in Design Presentation including viva and 86.6/100 in extempore.The evaluation process tested every participant’s knowledge on Rulebook, Design & Analysis, General Mechanical and Automotive Engineering. Based on the performance in Virtual BAJA, the team has been selected for participation in the main event to be held at IIT Ropar, Punjab or NATRIP, Pithampur near Indore. The event is being coordinated by the Automobile Club, Department of Mechanical Engineering. Dr. Balbir Singh Head, Mechanical Engineering Department, Prof. V. Verma (Dean FoE) congratulated the team for the success. Honorable Vice Chancellor, SMVDU Dr. Sanjeev Jain has also conveyed his best wishes to the team.

SMVDU Katra: Campus Recruitment Program-2018 commences at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Katra with its students training program “Campus-to-Corporate Readiness” which concluded on 18th August 2017. SMVDU had hired a professional training organization from Chennai to conduct the training program on Soft Skills, Aptitude & other attributes of Campus Placement process. A team of four qualified trainers conducted the program in SMVDU from 9 – 18 August 2017, wherein about 200 students of Engineering, Management and MCA participated.

It is pertinent to mention that Prof. Sanjeev Jain, Vice Chancellor, SMVDU immediately after joining last year had instructed Training and Placement Cell to conduct such training program for students grooming & personality development. Prof. Jain always advises the students that a good personality along with good communication, soft, presentation skills is must to ensure employment in industry. Training and Placement Officer Mr. B. K. Bhatia coordinated the above 10 day’s program.

SMVDU Katra: Senior General Manager at Panasonic India Pvt. Ltd., Amitabh Reu visited Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University and had an interaction with students of School of Business. Mr. Amitabh Reu talked about the various challenges that he has faced in 24 years of his professional career at different positions in various organisations like USHA, Samsung, and Panasonic. He emphasized that students should be able to implement the classroom teachings into real life situations. In his brief description about the company he said Panasonic as a brand has one of the largest portfolio of products in the world. Investment in research and development has paid us, we provide lithium-ion batteries to various organisations and Tesla is one them .Tesla and Panasonic have now officially started making batteries at the Giga factory, Nevada. Department of Police of various States like Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Bengaluru, Rajasthan and Kerala use our Tough pad because of its reliability and portability. He also talked about the strategies that Panasonic followed to overcome the multiple channel conflict. Company launched a new brand Sanyo which was made exclusively available on online E-commerce site Amazon and it is also going to be made available on other E-commerce sites by next month. The reason for opting multi brand portfolio strategy than launching a new product under parent brand was to protect the brand image of Panasonic and interests of other channel partners who provide company with 98% of sales.

The talk was followed by extensive question session. Moreover, he also exhibited his passion for music. We need to prioritize things and we cannot de-hyphenate professional and personal life. He also mentioned how he keeps himself updated by reading various articles and case studies of Harvard Business Review and advised students to always follow ethical behaviour if they want to succeed in long term. Training and Placement Officer Mr. B.K. Bhatia felicitated him by presenting a memento at the conclusion of the session. Dr. Hari Goving Mishra, Director IQAC, was the organizer of the program.

SMVDU Katra: Padam Shri Professor K. L. Chopra, father of thin-film technology, Ex-Director, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, interacted with first year students of B.Tech. and M.Tech. at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University yesterday. Professor Chopra highlighted the importance of basic Sciences in Engineering and challenging areas where today’s engineers shall work to meet urgent issues being faced by our country and its citizens. Professor Chopra advised students to broaden their horizon by adopting multi-disciplinary approaches, project based learning and use of latest technology to make products using local resources for common masses as well as industries. Dr. Balbir Singh, Head, Department of Mechanical Engineering expressed vote of thanks to Professor K. L. Chopra for his interactive and motivational sessions with students of SMVDU. It is pertinent to note that professor Chopra is member of the Executive Council and Academic Audit Committee of the University.

SMVDU Katra: As the new academic session 2017-18 starts on 1st of August, Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University organized the general orientation session in the Matrika Auditorium. Around 300 newly admitted students and more than 150 parents attended the session. Dr. Sumeet Gupta dean Academic Affairs welcomed the students and parents and discussed the academic pattern of the University in details. He also mentioned that the parents are worthy of congratulation as they support the academic aspirations of their wards and expressed hope that the new students will do well and understand their responsibilities. Prof. D. Mukhopadhyaya Dean of faculty of Management introduced various programs and impressed upon that hard work has no alternatives and called for nurturing talents under the guidance of teachers. Dr. Vandana Sharma Dean Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences introduced various departments and programs and impressed upon integrity and human values, soft-skills like communication skills and other literary activities. Prof. V. K. Bhat Dean Faculty of Sciences and Registrar introduced the programs of faculty of Sciences and emphasized how academic activities are meant for transformation of life. Heads of various department, namely Prof. Baijnath Kaushik, Dr. Balbir Singh, Dr. K. R. Jha, Dr. Sanjeev Anand, Ar. Aditya Kumar Singh, Prof. B. Kamaiah, Dr.Sushil Kumar Mehta, Dr. A. K. Das, Dr. Sharada P., Dr.V.K. Tripathi, introduced their respective programs and activities.

Vice-Chancellor Prof. Sanjeev Jain in his address expressed that our academic programs are one of the most updated programs in India and provide opportunity for learning beyond the syllabi and beyond the classroom. Today, the contemporary education is undergoing a paradigm-shift – from content delivery to process-learning, from isolated disciplines to inter-disciplinary learning, from lock-step progress to continuous progress, teacher-centric learning to student-centric learning, single instructional process to multiple instructional process, we have made our campus efficient to meet all these requirements posed by the paradigm-shift. Training & Placement Officer Mr.B.K.Bhatia, Dean of Student Dr. Yugal Khajuria and Faculty I/c Central Library Dr.Suparn Sharma also introduced their activities in great details. The session ended with a much extended interaction with students and parents.

SMVDU Katra: The 71st Independence Day was observed at Shri Mata vaishno Devi University with great fanfare and gaiety. The day begaaan with arrival of the Vice Chancellor Dr. Sanjeev Jain for Guard of Honour at Inaugural Plaza who unfurled the national flag at 10am. In his address he emphasized the importance of the heritage of the freedom struggle and the contemporary challenges to the freedom today. He stressed upon the greater responsibility of academic institutions as the high political and social ideals of social justice, empowerment, employment, eradication of poverty etc. cannot be achieved without empowerment of the youth through knowledge, skill development, and technical education for solving social problems. And, for all these the greater onus lies on the academic institutions. Without relevant and usable knowledge the problems of a society cannot be solved merely through slogans and propagandas. Teachers and students have greater responsibility to shape the future of our civilization.

The Board of Cultural Activities presented a cultural show in the Matrika Auditorium. Ankit, Avani and Amit presented speech and poetry, Manav, Vaibhav, Shikha, Ansul, Abhishek, Sanchit and Nitish presented cultural performances, Theater Club presented a mime, Viklap and family kids also presented their cultural items. Registrar Prof. V. K. Bhat, Dean Faculty of Management Prof. D. Mukhopadhyaya, Dean of Students Dr. Yugal Khajuria, Dean Academic Affairs Dr. Sumeet Gupta, and Heads of the Departments, faculty, staff, all family members and kids of Vikalp were present. The show ended with a vote of thanks by Vice President BCA Dr. Rakesh Kumar. Event was coordinated by Mr. Gaurav Jamwal, Mr. Opinder Sidhu, Vivek Soni, Anshul, Khushboo Julfi, Mangalam Bharat, Vaibhav, Abhishek Mahajan and Arjun Singh Thakur. In the afternoon, ‘Border’ movie was displayed in the auditorioum and the show was managed by Anand Bharti and Sameer Sengar.

Five Days Workshop on Intelligent System and IoT (Internet of Things) is being organized by Intel ‘FICE ‘Bengaluru at SMVDU in Intel Integrated System Lab (IoT-5G Lab) from 31st July – 4th Aug 2017. The main aim and motivation for organizing this workshop is to expose the students and Faculty to the latest technology & Trends for developing the solutions around cyber physical system and internet of things. The solutions mainly focused on smart cities applications to solve community (social) problems.

The Experts from Intel ‘FICE’ Bengaluru Mr. Suryender Kumar and Mr. Abhishek Srivastava shall carry out the entire training program, where all the students would be trained on INTEL EDISON Board as a Gateway Device for developing the IOT applications which uses Python Programming, Arduino Programming & running on embedded Linux operating systems using various sensors.

Dr. Rakesh Jha, coordinator of the workshop highlighted the importance of the workshop and briefed the participants about the topics to be covered in this workshop over next 05 days. More than 70 participants including faculty and students of the University are attending the workshop. Vice-Chancellor Dr. Sanjeev Jain extended his wishes to all the participants for the fruitful learnings out of this workshop. Dr. K.R. Jha, Head of the department also wished his fruitful wishes for the participants.

SMVDU Katra: The second meeting of project monitoring committee (PMC) was held at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Kakryal, Katra on August 11, 2017 to review J&K projects. The meeting was chaired by Prof. R. P. Sharma INSA Senior Scientist, National Research Centre for Plant Biotechnology, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI). The other expert members of PMC who attended the meeting were Dr. Meenakshi Munshi Adviser/Scientist G- Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science & Technology, Prof. Manoj K. Dhar, Professor School of Biotechnology, University of Jammu, Dr. Ashwani Pareek, Associate Professor, Stress Physiology and Molecular Biology Laboratory School of Life Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Dr. R. S. Manik, Principal Scientist Animal Biotechnology Centre ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute Karnal and Dr. P. S. Yadav, Principal Scientist (Animal Physiology) Central Institute for Research on Buffaloes, Hisar, Haryana and Project Monitoring committee has been constituted by DBT to critically review and monitor the progress of the on-going projects vis-à-vis the objectives and milestones and to recommend corrective measure as and when required.

The meeting was attended by Project Investigators from different universities of Jammu and Kashmir like SKUAST-Kashmir, IUST Awantipora, SKUAST Kargil, University of Kashmir and BGSBU Rajouri. The Project investigators presented the progress of projects before committee Members. The project monitoring committee reviewed the status and progress of 11 ongoing research projects sanctioned by DBT under special call for J&K State. The meeting was organized with financial support from DBT and all other necessary logistics from SMVDU. The meeting was jointly coordinated by Prof. V. Verma, Head Department of Biotechnology & Dean Faculty of Engineering and Dr. Shafaq Rasool, Assistant Professor, Department of Biotechnology.