REVERB TEAM: EDITORS:SANJAY MANI V SAI PRASAD

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GROUND BREAKING CEREMONY

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:
INDEPENDENCE DAY

ADVAYA

This was big for us. Huge. We were all trying so hard to see that all went well in the biggest landmark event till date for IIT Hyderabad The Ground Breaking Ceremony.

IIT Madras, our mentor institute.

MENTOR PROGRAM

BASKETBALL LEAGUE

E-SUMMIT

ARTICLE WRITING COMPETITION

CARTOON CORNER

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The Chief Minister, who had attended a wedding in Tirupati that noon, landed at the venue at about 1630hrs. The event began with the distinguished chief The ceremony was guests performing held on the bhoomi puja at the propitious site of our occasion of permanent campus. Dusshera on Models of some of Thursday, the 6th the buildings that The Honble CM and other distinguished of October, 2011. were to come up at guests watch as the Director lights the lamp The honorary Chief our new campus were to signal the start of the Bhoomi Puja. Minister of AP Shri exhibited. The N. Kiran Kumar speeches that Reddy, Deputy CM of AP Shri Damodar followed were indeed thought-provoking. Rajanarasimha, Minister of State for While the Chief Minister pointed out on HRD Smt. D. Purandeswari and the how he was involved in the think-tank Chairman of IIT Hyderabad's Board of that gave way to IIT Hyderabad and Governors Shri Ajai Chowdry (HCL stressed on the importance of brand Founder-Chairman) graced the occasion Hyderabad, Smt. Purandeswari rewith their charismatic presence. marked on the importance of serving the motherland and talked about how The event also saw the presence of brain gain, the converse phenomenon of Japanese delegates, who constitute the brain drain (that saw a lot of talent mibackbone of the institutes collaboration grate to the west), would benefit our with Japan. Among the others who country. Prof. Desai, our director, talked made it to the ceremony were Prof. R.D. at length about the expansion plans of Koilpillai and Prof. C. Pandurangan from

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IIT Hyderabad. Shri Ajai Chowdry talked about the points that made IIT Hyderabad stand out, in so less a time as three years. After the speeches, the CM took off in his helicopter. Subsequently, a high tea was arranged for the invitees. The students came back to the hostel premises at about 1900hrs. They ended the day dancing to the groovy tunes of the DJ, who was waiting at the hostel for their arrival. The event received good media coverSaluting the tri-colour

age, with about ten minutes of the CMs speech telecasted live in prominent news channels. All the efforts that had gone into making the ceremony successful had paid off. The new campus is slated to be ready for occupancy by July of 2013. Heres hoping that all happenings at IIT Hyderabad are as thriving and wishing that the permanent campus will be very soon ready. - T Aditya Srinivas Literary Secretary

INDEPENDENCE DAY CELEBRATIONS

Enthusiasm ran through the veins of all, as this day meant a feeling of pride and patriotism

The most anticipated day after the start of college was 15th August, the Independence Day. Enthusiasm ran through the veins of all, as this day meant a feeling of pride and patriotism, and the students also awaited certain events. Independence Day was celebrated with lots of enjoyment and the display of miniprojects added to the grace of the occasion. On the morning of 15th August, the institute looked completely geared-up for the occasion with the tricolor ready to be hoisted. Wonderful arrangements were made for all the guests and students. Every student who had come to the institute was given a tricolor that could be pinned to

the shirt, which would impart a sense of patriotism to the mind. The series of events included a few introductory speeches. Patriotic songs were sung, the National Anthem being the most important. Short plays were also enacted. Later followed the demonstration of mini-projects, which was the outcome of 15 days of effort by the students. Display of projects attracted a lot of attention. The robot race was also a well-sought event. Indeed, it would definitely not be an overstatement if wed say that the first celebration of this year in IITH came-off in a grand way. Jai Hind! - Vaibhav Kshirsagar (1st year)

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FEST OUTLOOK - ADVAYA

Sounds fresh, doesnt it? We are talking about Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabads intra-institute first tech-fest Advaya. It strives to bring out the best of talents in the tech-savvy youth of the premier institute. The punch-line goes like this The unique and absolute truth without duality. It is with these pillaring values that the first Advaya team started working towards pulling off the fest.
Inauguration Ceremony

Man's everincreasing quest for knowledge has been the reason for the exponential development over the ages.

The festival spanned over the first weekend of November and saw encouraging participation from the student community. The inauguration ceremony was preceded over by Dr. FA Khan, Dean (Academics) and Dr. Vinod Janaradhanan, Faculty Advisor of Sci-Tech Council, both of whom enlightened the students about the increasing role that technology was playing in peoples lives. Events were organized by the seven technical clubs at IITH, from across the spectrum of engineering disciplines. While budding electrical engineers pondered over baffling circuits, computer geeks tried their hands at Pro-quest and Gotroot, a hacking event. The automobile club Torque, coming off a successfully organized lecture by Dilip Chhabria as recently as last week, hosted the Auto Quiz and a couple of design contests. The Robotics Club organized Robo-basketball event, which saw robots trying to hoop in ping pong balls into a net. For the not-so-interested-in-technical stuff- people, there was this Informals stage, where fun events ran parallelly. The closing ceremony was held at 1800hrs on Sunday, the 6th of November 2011. Prizes were distributed to the winners of competitions held over the weekend as a part of the fest by Dr. KC Sahu. The Science and Technology Secretary signed off the festival, hoping that Advaya will be back bigger and better the next time around. - T Aditya Srinivas

Robo-basketball

Hacking Event

Presentation Ceremony

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IIT HYDERABAD BATHES IN ONAM SPLENDOUR

the game. Musical chairs was conducted exclusively for girls. They all moved around the chairs with the hope of winning the game, but Rojimol edged out all others and won the competition. The runner up was Kavitha. Uriyadi too was organised in which boys participated in large numbers. They needed to break the pot within minimum duration of time. People were throwing water on the contestants but it didnt hamper their spirits. Navanshu Ahuja of 1st year won the competition. Tug of War was also conducted. In this event, all participants struggled a lot to pull the opposition and showcase their power. Chatas ( a team of 4th years) led by Vamshi Krishna emerged as the winners of the game. People were enjoying that day to the fullest. It was a day completely free from the daily routine and monotonous lectures. Hats off to the organisers. Celebration of festivals like Onam that are backed by lofty ideals, is indeed needed for instilling a sense of security, faith and meaning to life. All the students had a memorable day that they would cherish for a long time. - Mayank Rathi ( 1st year )

Onam was celebrated in a grand and colourful manner by students of IITH. Various competitions were organised as a part of the celebrations. Onam is perhaps the only day when each single student is at his traditional best. A day when they make impact on others with their stunning looks in Malayali dresses. Girls wore white sari and boys wore mundu and shirt. The traditional attire looked really awesome on most of the people. The day started with students working hard to prepare Pookalam, which graced the courtyard of Little Place. It took almost 3 hours as they were trying to make their Pookalam the best. Spoon Race was held for girls. No explanations needed as everyone is very familiar with this. The girls really showed great enthusiasm in the game. Kusuma and Anitha turned out to be the winner and runner up respectively, of

Celebration of festivals like Onam that are backed by lofty ideals, is indeed needed for instilling a sense of security, faith and meaning to life.

Students having fun in events like Urivadi organized on Onam

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MENTOR PROGRAM - 2011

team comprised of 2 mentors who were assigned certain freshmen. The total of 136 Mentor students were split into 11 mentor groups. Mentee group under This was certainly a successful effort in obtaining unity from diversity. Anuj and
Kriti.

A rising sun on 28th August marked the beginning of a new stage of life for 136 students who entered IIT Hyderabad after a long tough battle. These 4 years that they will be spending will be the most influential years of their life. To support these students and guide them, a unique mentor program was started. The mentor program was started as a part of the counseling cell to help the students adapt to the culture of IIT Hyderabad quickly. The mentors were our seniors who themselves had volunteered to be a part of this program. Each

The mentor activity started from the very next day and the first task was to ensure that every fresher was a lively part of IIT H. Interaction ensured that each student gets to know the others as well. Regular mentor meetings were called, to make sure that we adjusted to the hostels, mess and IIT in general. Mentors were the strong pillars in our life who guided, supported and protected us. They were the ones whom we could have faith in, whom we could look up to. As we have adjusted to our life here, the programs importance faded but we will never forget those mentors who laid the foundation stone of our IIT life. Thanking all mentors. - Vaibhav Kshirsagar ( 1st year)

They were the ones whom we could have faith in, whom we could look up to.

NSS [National Service Scheme] at IIT Hyderabad

IIT Hyderabad encourages students to be a part of NSS. This helps students to realize their responsibility to the nation, instead of being glued to books all the time. Like some other IITs, IIT Hyderabad is also doing its part in NSS. Every Saturday NSS candidates visit different schools and help students to clarify their doubts in their studies. This is beneficial for both NSS candidates as well as the school students. Students feel free to ask their doubts to us without any hesitation because we create a friendly relation with the students. Our benefit is that we get a chance to do social service
The NSS team and gain a new experience in the teaching others. NSS team also conducts other campaigns like cloth donation, blood donation and tree plantation, which indeed is a true service to the humankind, environment and wildlife. Recently IITH invited school students and showed them the campus including physics, chemistry, computer labs and workshop etc., thus also creating enthusiasm among students to study hard and become a part of the coveted IIT system. This indeed is a great service, IIT Hyderabad students are doing to the nation. - Vivek Kaname ( 1st year )

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IITH Basketball League

having kept the maximum money at end, challenged the Hawks for another set of finales and Hawks justified the titles of winners by edging out the opposition in extra time in a nail-biting match. The presentation ceremony took place just after the finale at court itself in which a huge turnout could be seen. Sagar Tayade was declared the Best Player among freshmen and the Find of the Tournament was Navanshu Ahuja, who played beyond the expectations and really amazed others with his performance. Nagamani was the best girl player, although not even a single girl scored in the whole tournament. Gattu Vinay bagged the title of the Best Manager after all, he used to give tooth brush and paste to his players. The most sensational player was Yatharth (in pic4th from right) and the best defensive player was Adithyan. One other award of the most entertaining team was given to Green Razorbacks (manager: Kunal Aggarwal). The whole credit of this thrilling league goes to the organizers, Nagaraj Mahajan (with most 3 pointers), Abishek Ramesh (Least Fouls) and Pramod (Most Valuable Player). They truly deserve a big round of applause. This league will be back again soon with loads of fun.

the real league started with a spectacular and vibrant start and all the teams struggled a lot to win every single match they played.

The Silver Hawks having their proud moment

On the lines of NBA, basketball league was organized at IIT Hyderabad showcasing the talent of the students. Auctions were conducted in the institute in which a total of 8 managers bid to buy their respective team players. Many students gathered there to witness the auction. Naveen Chintamaneni (in pic 3rd from right) shocked all of them by buying Balaji Kasi for 4.3 lakhs. Sheetal was the highest paid girl. After the auctions, the league started with a bash on 21st august and continued for almost a month. When all the teams played 3 matches each, re-auctions took place but still, the costliest players remained the same. After re-auctions, the real league started with a spectacular and vibrant atmosphere and all the teams gave their everything to win every single match they played. The series of finales was played between Black Stalwarts (manager: Sai Prasad) and Silver Hawks (manager: Namratha Reddy) which ended with the Hawks bagging the title of winners. But that was not the end of the league. Fire Stallions (White)

-Mayank Rathi ( 1st year)

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Amazing Race at IIT Hyderabad

shoe appropriately in the shoe case was a nice idea. All the participants had to think hard to solve the riddles and the crossword. For three hours all the participants were running around the hostel to complete tasks. Then the organizing team picked the winning team who completed their tasks in the least time. Prizes were then distributed to winning & the runners-up teams. I was a member of winning team and I enjoyed the whole game. It was a nice experience to crack riddles and to complete physical tasks. It took so much time for us to solve one particular riddle which was related to TV room. But finally, we completed all the tasks in time and bagged the first prize. We thank the organizers for having organized such a fun-filled event. - Swapnesh Wagh ( 1st year)
The game was all about solving riddles and performing a physical task at each checkpoint.

The winners of the race.

On the second Sunday of August, the Cultural Council of IIT Hyderabad organized The Amazing Race to increase the interaction of freshmen with the seniors. The game was all about solving riddles and performing a physical task at each checkpoint. The Cultural Council had worked a lot to make the game interesting. There were a total of 9 teams of 3 members each, some of these teams also contained students from second year. Keeping physical tasks at each checkpoint like making a pyramid of play cards, hitting a single stump with a throw of the ball, throwing

GOLCONDA TRIP
Students of IIT Hyderabad went on a tour to the historic Golconda fort on the third Sunday of August dated 21st. The trip was specially arranged for freshmen by mentor groups of IIT Hyderabad. All the freshmen were so excited about the trip, but all of them could not attend the tour as the basketball league was starting on same day. The ones who could, enjoyed the whole day with their classmates and some seniors. We started our journey early in the morning and passed time all along the way by playing Antakshari in the bus. It was a great opportunity for freshmen to know their classmates as they had spent just 3 weeks at the IIT Hyderabad campus. After reaching the destination, everyone hurried towards the ticket counter. All of them got distributed in groups after getting tickets and started wandering in the fort.
Students enjoying themselves at the Golconda Fort

Everyone wanted to get a fantastic pic in front of the fort. Soon, the students got hungry after walking for 4 hours and so, they moved back and had lunch at a restaurant on the way. It was a very enthusiastic and amazing trip for us. Thanks to all mentors. was the reply most freshmen gave after the trip, which was so useful for them as they made new friends and got to know their classmates. - Swapnesh Wagh ( 1st year )

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E-SUMMIT
The domains they covered were: - Road ahead for young entrepreneurs, especially IITians. - Emphasize on critical issues faced by entrepreneurs and start-ups at early stages of their product development, especially funding options. - Mistakes young entrepreneurs generally make. - Talk on women entrepreneurship by Miss. Dolly Bhasin. "Our aim was to foster the spirit of entrepreneurship among the youth, especially the students. We wanted this to be a medium where they all could interact, network and exchange ideas and as the time passes, we'll surely be able to connect with more students and get them on board with us" said Aman Bagade, Managing Director, E -Cell, IIT Hyderabad at the finale of the event. Overall, E-Summit was a grand success and I hope the E-Cell team hosts it every year. - Sanjay Mani ( 2nd year )

E-Summit was held in IIT Hyderabad on Saturday, 15th October. It was organized by Entrepreneurship Cell (E-Cell), IIT Hyderabad in association with Canara Bank. It was attended by not only IIT Hyderabad students, but also by students from various other colleges. The speakers were Mr. Rajat Dhariwal founder of MadRat Games (http://www.aksharit.com/), Mr. Ashutosh Lawania founder of Myntra.com (http://www.myntra.com) and Ms. Dolly Bhasin founder of SPH Consultancy & eServices Pvt. Ltd. The E-Summit went on for about 4 hours, with each speaker speaking on the topic : "Youth Entrepreneurship". They also gave a view on their personal experiences and the difficulties they faced while setting up their respective enterprises. Towards the end , there was a Q&A session in which all students actively participated.

Our aim was to foster the spirit of entrepreneurship among the youth, especially the students.

Mr. Rajat Dharival

Ms. Dolly Bhasin

Mr. Ashutosh Lawania

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ARTICLE WRITING COMPETITION

The Million-Dollar Question
Sometimes, a few words can change your life completely. They can change your thinking completely. At first, it may sound like a casual sentence, but it has a much deeper meaning with the power to bring you back to reality. A similar thing happened to me on a fine Sunday after I joined IITH. While strolling the streets of the city, there came a moment when I was alone with a friend of mine. We started a casual conversation. Suddenly he asked me, When will you come to IITH? I was totally taken aback on this statement of his and replied that I was already here. He just looked at me and smiled. His reply to me changed my life, and it finally brought me here. He said, Being present at some place doesnt mean physical presence. You need to pour out your mind & heart being here. It has been 5-6 hours that we have been roaming today, and all I hear from you are the stories of your friends back home, all your past memories. You are still in your city. There is not a single sign which could point to your getting accustomed to this environment. It seems like you dont want to call this place your home. I gave it quite a thought. He was right. After that incident, I really got into the spirit of being in IITH. I am happy and satisfied now that I can finally call this place Home. - Surabhi Ganvir ( 2nd year )
Being present at some place doesnt mean physical presence. You need to pour out your mind & heart being here.

My Life In IIT Hyderabad

I gave my JEE and relaxed. Like all my peers, I was fuelled with the desire to join an IIT. Of course, I expected a great life at an IIT as goes the hype. (There is a new term coined for this called IITphobiatis). As the admission day drew closer, my excitement grew without bounds. Finally, I am at IIT, which I considered as my dream destination for two years. It is all fun out here. Here, there are amazing people, peers from all parts of the country, clubs, trips, interactions, ideas-what not? On my first day, the sight of a student wearing an ELAN T-shirt the opposite way made a mark on my mind. A whole new world opened up. I never played any sport other than cricket and was amazed by the magnitude of sports played here. And of course, not to forget commentators of the matches. Fun is everywhere. Ever placed a handkerchief in a bus seat to occupy it? Here keep your bucket in front of the bathroom to indicate that you are the next in queue to take bath. People rush to the mess immediately after the bath. In the superbly hygienic mess, typically there will be three curries available, but no dosas for them due to the huge public demand. "When the whole world sleeps, we awake". We enjoy nights with music, dance, fun, chatting, celebrating birthdays (birthday blasts and drenching each other with water from head to feet), and there are also a few species that keep studying. My life at IITH has been intellectually stimulating having listened to amazing lectures, fun filled memories with amazing friends and the exciting journey is continuing........ - Y. Aditya ( 1st year )

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A Wealthy Experience
IIT The first impression accompanied with this word is a sense of being into books, studious and sincere attitude of the students, but people are unaware of the fun and fuzz at the IIT's. After clearing the JEE exam, though my priorities were of selecting an already established IIT, with Hyderabad being the emerging global hub of computer technology tempted me to take a risk on choosing IIT Hyderabad. Finally, here I am in the Chemical Engineering Dept. at IIT Hyderabad. Then began the journey of fun and excitement, with my hopes at the peak, but also with a bit of uncertainty. Soon, we were interacting with seniors and vying to explore and get into the activities of OUR IIT. Feeling good about being at the institute, looking at our institute building and our great infrastructure, we felt as good seeing our hostels, rooms and particularly, the cleanliness, which is taken care of regularly, which was quite unexpected... The past two months flourished with my indulgence in sports, academics and events like treasure hunt, basketball league and being a part of the organization team of marketing and finance domain of IIT Hyderabads Fest ELAN. One thing to be learnt is that an individual has many chances and opportunities to develop his personality in the various domains here. Though worries about future, our placements still sustain, the spirit of fun and frolic that goes through in bits at each time, are the things that will be relived the spirit of via memories ever after... Having seen the prevailing enthusiasm in the students here, I dont know if it would have been right choosing one of the other IITs, but I do know that I didnt DO ANYTHING WRONG opting for IIT Hyderabad. - Navanshu Ahuja

fun and frolic that goes through in bits at each time are things that will be relived via Memories ever after

Reverb Team:
Editors: Sanjay Mani, V. Sai Prasad

Quick Quiz
1 In what year was the Queen Mother born? 2 What sort of creature is a gecko? 3 Which US novelist wrote The Wizard Of Oz? 4 What was Indias target in the rather infamous Sydney Test? 5 On which river does the town of Rotherham stand? ANSWERS: 1 1900 3 L. Frank Baum 5 River Don 2 A lizard 4 333