Kurukshetra is an international techno-management fest conducted annually by the

College of Engineering, Guindy The College of Engineering, Guindy (CEG) is a public engineering college situated in Chennai, India. It is Asia's oldest technical institution, founded in 1794. It is also the oldest technical institution to be established outside Europe. Histo ...

(CEG) in

Chennai, Tamil Nadu Chennai, also known as Madras (List of renamed places in India#Tamil Nadu, its official name until 1996), is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Tamil Nadu by population, largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost states and ...

, India. It is a four-day event organized by the college's largest technical body, the CEG Tech Forum (CTF). The name of the fest derives from the location of the apocalyptic battle between the

Kaurava ''Kaurava'' is a Sanskrit term which refers to descendants of Kuru, a legendary king of India who is the ancestor of many of the characters of the epic ''Mahabharata''. Usually, the term is used for the 100 sons of King Dhritarashtra and his ...

s and the

Pandavas The Pandavas (Sanskrit: पाण्डव, aɳɖɐʋᵊ IAST: Pāṇḍava) is a group name referring to the five legendary brothers, Yudhishtira, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva, who are central figures of the Hindu epic ''Mahabhara ...

in the ancient Indian epic, the ''

Mahabharata The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; , , ) is one of the two major Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epics of ancient India revered as Smriti texts in Hinduism, the other being the ''Ramayana, Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the events and aftermath of the Kuru ...

.'' The tag-line of the fest, "The Battle of Brains", refers to the battle. The fest was first held in 2007 and was the first techno-management festival in India to be awarded

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

patronage. Its logo, the

cyclotron A cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator invented by Ernest Lawrence in 1929–1930 at the University of California, Berkeley, and patented in 1932. Lawrence, Ernest O. ''Method and apparatus for the acceleration of ions'', filed: Januar ...

, symbolizes the celebration of the indomitable spirit of engineering and innovation.

Working committee

The festival is organized by CEG Tech Forum. Founded in 2006, the Forum is a student-run organization, currently consisting of 19 teams: Brand Relations, Content, Design, Events, Finance, Guest Lectures, Hospitality, Human Resources, Industry Relations and Media, Initiatives, Internal Auditing, Logistics, Marketing, Projects, Promo, Quality Assurance and Control, Technical Operations, Workshops, Xceed (outreach) and Karnival (entertainment). Overall, there are around 600 members at various levels of the hierarchy.

History

Hosted for the first time in January 2007, the fest included workshops entitled "Autonomous Robotics", "Ethical Hacking", "Alcatraz" and "Need for Speed" as part of the event. The project exhibition event received an overwhelming response with more than 250 entries and 25 teams short-listed for the final display. Kurukshetra was the first student-organized tech fest in India to receive

patronage, in 2011. Kurukshetra was also titled Green Fest by the UN Conference for

Sustainable Development Sustainable development is an approach to growth and Human development (economics), human development that aims to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.United Nations General ...

in the previous edition in 2012. The student-managed committee is certified to the

ISO 9001 The ISO 9000 family is a set of international standards for quality management systems. It was developed in March 1987 by International Organization for Standardization. The goal of these standards is to help organizations ensure that they meet ...

:2015 quality standard.

Karnival

Karnival is an event that presents displays on science, technology, arts, history and culture. Some of the past exhibits are a magic show and 3D-floor painting held in 2014, an Arjun tank demonstration and

laser tag Laser tag is a recreational shooting sport where participants use infrared-emitting light guns to tag designated targets. Infrared-sensitive signaling devices are commonly worn by each player to register hits and are sometimes integrated wit ...

game in 2015, and caricature workshop, photography workshop, Rubik's cube workshop and virtual reality exhibition in 2016.

Guest lectures

Workshops

The workshops range all over the radar of technology from aero-modelling, and robotics to motorcycles. Some of the notable workshops in previous editions are:

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kurukshetra CEG College festivals in India Technical festivals in India