On January 17, a team comprising Shwetank Choudhary, Harkeerat Singh, Sambit Ghosh and Ujjwal Gupta — all class XI science students of New Delhi’s Manavbharti India International School (MIIS) — won the ‘Future Cities India 2020’ competition for high schools in Delhi and the national capital territory region sponsored by the Union depart-ment of science & technology (DST) and the US-based infrastructure software development company Bentley Systems Inc. (annual revenue $500 million or Rs.2,400 crore). The Future Cities India competition attracted entries from 50 schools in Delhi NCR, of whom 15 qualified for the final round in August last.
The theme of the competition was centred around a reported Indian Railways plan to remodel and refurbish 22 aged railway stations countrywide into world class facilities, with New Delhi station being the first. The competing teams were assigned the task of redesigning the station utilising existing land, infrastructure and access zones with eco-friendly building materials. The reports were adjudged by a team of 15 professionals from railway engineering companies, DDA, DMRC, architects etc. “It was the experience of a life time. We learnt the importance of teamwork,” says Shwetank Choudhary, leader of the MIIS team.
Bentley’s BE Careers Network global director Scott Lofgren, who had specially flown to India for the final round, told EducationWorld: “The Future Cities India 2020 competition is our attempt to sustain the profession of engineering and attract young people to science and maths study progra-mmes. Currently the competition is staged only in the US and India. I hope with DST and other partners this competition will reach the rest of the country as well.”
The prize winning MIIS model incorporates a railway museum, a 400- metre tall observatory-cum-revolving restaurant, security and trauma centres, police block, budget and luxury hotels, underground parking, separate passages for segregation of passenger inflow, a four-storey commercial complex, an aquarium-cum-botanical garden, underground traffic stretches from the Paharganj side to make the station pedestrian friendly, and automated ticketing counters.
Autar Nehru (Delhi)