Roorkee (The Hawk): To analyze the economic and environmental impact of the COVID 19 pandemic induced reverse migration on the urban-rural continuum,Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT Roorkee), Institute for Global Environmental Strategies, Japan and Keio University, Japan collaborateto implement an India-Japan bilateral projectentitled“Ecosystem centric rural revitalization: Bridging the urban-rural dichotomy toward post-COVID resilient recovery”. The project is jointly funded Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), India, and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), The bilateral collaborative research will focus on two selected study sites including Haridwar in India and Kanagawa prefecture in Japan respectively. Haridwar is a holy Hindu pilgrimage center, which later became a prominent industrial hub after the formation of the Uttarakhand State in 2000 and the creation of SIIDCUL (State Infrastructure and Industrial Development Corporation Uttarakhand Limited) in 2002.The first project workshop was conducted in the Committee Room, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at IIT Roorkee on June 27, 2022.The objective of the workshop is to bring experts and key stakeholders into a common platform in order to discuss the social and environmental impact of COVID-19 pandemic-induced reverse migration on the urban-rural continuum and how reverse migration can be translated intoan opportunity foraddressing the urban-rural dichotomy. In the light of the objective,The workshop was attended by distinguished scholars and laureates viz., Prof. Subir Sen, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee; Prof. Anindya Jayanta Mishra, Head&nbsp;Department of Humanities and Social Science, IIT Roorkee; Dr. Bijon Kr. Mitra, IGES Japan; Prof. Ajit Kumar Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee; Dr. Anamitra Anurag Danda, Director, Sundarbans Programme, WWF India; Prof. Dinesh K. Nauriyal, Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee; Dr. Rajarshi Dasgupta, IGES Japan; Richa, PhD Scholar, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee; Md. Riyaj, PhD Scholar, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee; Shubham Sharma, PhD Scholar, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Roorkee; Prof. Sameer DeshkarDepartment of Architecture and Planning, Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology (VNIT), Nagpur; Prof. Rajib Shaw, Keio University, Japan; Prof. Uttam Kumar Roy, Associate Professor and&nbsp;Head Centre for Transportation Systems (CTRANS) (Internal Expert), IIT Roorkee; Prof. D. Bharat, Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences (Internal Expert), IIT Roorkee.While presenting the overview of the project, Dr. Bijon Kr. Mitra, IGES Japan, pointed out,"Urban and rural areas are strongly interconnected and failure to understand the strong linkages may affect the sustainability of the rural food-energy-water nexus. The proposed research will emphasize the policies adopted in India and Japan to support key economic sectors, making them resilient to disasters”. Talking about the expectations and challenges, Prof. Rajib Shaw, Keio University, said,"The proposed research is multidisciplinary in nature and one aspect is to develop a methodology for assessing the ecological capacity of an ecosystem to meet the demand of natural resources in the new normal. The key challenge, however, is to identify those successful initiatives helping economies to ‘bounce forward’ rather than ‘bouncing back’ to the old normal." Taking on the social impact, Prof. Ajit K Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee, said,"The project will demonstrate the pathways of eco-system centric revitalization of rural areas through diversification of its economy toward decentralized growth in the post-COVID-19 era. There is no need to re-invent the wheel to find solutions to complicated problems but harness the learnings cross-discipline and cross-country to identify sustainable growth strategies."Talking about reverse migration and COVID-19, Dr. Anamitra Anurag Danda, Director, Sundarbans Programme, WWF-India, highlighted,"Post COVID-19 lockdown has affected earnings in the state as both industries and tourism has come to a standstill. Understanding the economic and environmental impact of the COVID 19 pandemic induced reverse migration on the urban-rural continuum will guide the integration of spatial capitals for the post-COVID-19 economic recovery."

To analyze the economic and environmental impact of the COVID 19 pandemic induced reverse migration on the urban-rural continuum,Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT Roorkee), Institute for Global Environmental Strategies, Japan and Keio University, Japan collaborateto implement an India-Japan bilateral projectentitled“Ecosystem centric rural revitalization: Bridging the urban-rural dichotomy toward post-COVID resilient recovery”. 

IIT Roorkee Collaborates In An India-Japan Bilateral Research Project Under ICSSR And JSPS In The Field Of Social Sciences	

Roorkee

Roorkee (The Hawk):&nbsp;Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IITRoorkee), and the Water Resources Department, Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), New Delhi, jointly organize a National Hybrid Seminar on "Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs) and Landslide Lake Outburst Floods (LLOFs) Disasters in Himalayan Regions" on June 15, 2022, at IIT Roorkee and also online through WebEx. The Seminar will act as an opportunity for the exchange of ideas and knowledge between diverse groups of the scientific community concerned with the current issues related to Glacial and landslide lake outburst flood-related hazards and the development of standard codes for its mapping and modeling. It is envisaged to help make better documents and update and formulate new Indian Standards in the relevant field by serving as a forum for advancing innovation, development, and communication of best practices.BIS is an apex organization in the field of National Standardization which is carried out through 16 Division Councils covering various areas of Standardization. Water Resources Department is one of such 17 departments in BIS, and it deals with standardization and standards formulation in the area related to River Valley Projects and Ground Water.The conference was held in the presence of eminent dignitaries, namely, Shri Sanjay Pant, Deputy Director General (Standardization–II), BIS; Shri R. Bhanu Prakash, Scientist – E/Director &amp; Head, Water Resources Department, BIS; Prof. Manoranjan Parida, Deputy Director IIT Roorkee; Prof. Arun Kumar, Professor at Department of Hydro and Renewable Energy, IIT Roorkee and Coordinator of BIS related activities at IIT Roorkee; Prof. C. S. P. Ojha, Department of Civil Engg. IIT, Roorkee; Dr. Ajanta Goswami, Dept. of Earth Sciences and Dr. Mohit Prakash Mohanty, Dept. of Water Resources Development and Management, IIT Roorkee. On this occasion, expert lectures were delivered by eminent scientists in the field of Glaciology and Cryospheric Science, namely, Dr. Anil V. Kulkarni, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore; Dr. Ravinder Singh, National Disaster Management Authority, New Delhi; Dr. Sanjay Kumar Jain, National Institute of Hydrology, Roorkee; Dr. Tapas Ranjan Martha, and Shri. B.Simhadri Rao, National Remote Sensing Centre, ISRO Hyderabad; Dr. Praveen Thakur &amp; Dr. Pratima Pandey, Indian Institute of Remote Sensing, ISRO Dehradun. During the panel discussion, relevant experts from different organizations participated, highlighted their opinion on the subject, and helped prepare a framework for GLOF &amp; LLOF-related Standardization and code development.Shri Sanjay Pant, Deputy Director General (Standardization–II), BIS, highlighted,"The Indian Himalayan Region is vulnerable to Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs) due to thinning of glaciers resulting in enlargement of lakes at a very rapid pace. This resulted in making lakes unstable and causing catastrophic flash floods. BIS is on its way to framing national standards in this field so that the consequences of such incidents can be controlled and their financial/environmental/social impact can be minimized." Prof. Ajit Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee, said,"After the catastrophic flash floods in the recent past such as in the case of Chorabari Lake during Kedarnath Disaster in 2013, strengthening resilience to reduce the GLOF risk is an important first step towards facing such challenges in the future."Prof. Manoranjan Parida, Deputy Director, IIT Roorkee, said,"Glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) are a serious and potentially increasing threat to livelihoods and infrastructure in most high-mountain regions of the world. The conference is to integrate modelling approaches that capture both current and future potential for GLOF triggering, quantification of affected downstream areas, and assessment of the underlying societal vulnerability to such climate-related disasters."

 Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IITRoorkee), and the Water Resources Department, Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), New Delhi, jointly organize a National Hybrid Seminar on "Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs) and Landslide Lake Outburst Floods (LLOFs) Disasters in Himalayan Regions" on June 15, 2022, at IIT Roorkee and also online through WebEx. 

BIS & IIT Roorkee Organize Seminar On GLOFs &  LLOFs Disasters In Himalayan Regions

Roorkee (The Hawk): Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IITRoorkee), organized the fourth 15-days training program on Road Safety Audit from May 30, 2022 to June 13, 2022, in association with Indian Roads Congress (IRC) and the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH). The program is a part of the road safety initiative taken up by the Government of India to have a pool of well-trained road safety auditors in the country.Road safety is an issue of paramount importance globally and is a matter of great concern for India in particular. According to the Road Accident Statistics published by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH), road accidents claimed more than 130,000 lives in India during 2020. While the major contributors of road traffic crashes can be primarily due to many reasons including driver’s error, over-speeding, drinking and driving, and the negligence of other drivers; but a significant proportion of road accidents may occur as the result of poorly designed roads. Poor road design can lead to life-threatening injuries and serious accidents with motor vehicles, pedestrians, bicycles and motorized two-wheelers. India is losing almost 3 % of its GDP in roads crashes. To eliminate such road crashes, one of the most effective methods is to audit a road project, right from its design stage till its opening to the traffic.The inaugural event of the course was hosted at the Department of Civil Engineering (CED) which was attended by Prof. A. K. Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee; Prof. P. K. Sikdar, President of Intercontinental Consultants and Technocrats Private Limited, New Delhi; Prof. Manoranjan Parida, Deputy Director; Prof. Praveen Kumar, Head of the Civil Engineering Department; Prof. Sanhita Das, Course Coordinator; Prof. Indrajit Ghosh, Prof. Amit Agarwal and Prof. Pushpa Choudhary, Course Co-coordinators; and many others. The event was inaugurated and graced with the online presence of Shri. Sanjay Kumar Nirmal, Secretary General, IRC and Additional Director General (ADG), MoRTH.Congratulating IIT Roorkee for successfully conducting earlier three courses, Shri. Sanjay Kumar Nirmal, the Chief Guest of the inaugural event, shed some light on the MoU signed between IIT Roorkee, MoRTH and IRC for conducting such courses to achieve the target of reducing road crashes to 50% by the year 2030. He pointed out, “India, being one of the largest road networks in the world, the situation of road safety becomes even more alarming in our country. Among different vehicles involved in road accidents, two-wheelers accounted for the highest share in total accidents and fatalities in the year 2020, which needs immediate attention and suitable interventions at the grass-root level.”Dr. P. K. Sikdar, President, Intercontinental Consultants and Technocrats Private Limited and the former director of CSIR-CRRI, highlighted,“The existing road safety issues in our country, importance of Road safety audit in the current situation and appealed to all the participants to take care of finer details of the design and construction to reduce the number of crashes.”The course curriculum for the 15-days training program included an extensive 7-days lecture sessions delivered by several renowned academicians, consultants, and practitioners like from SPA Delhi, CSIR-CRRI, IIT Roorkee, ICT New Delhi, iRAP, RITES Ltd., Save Life Foundation and Punjab Police, to name a few. It was then followed by physical site visits near Roorkee city and evaluation/examination of the participants. The valedictory session was held on June 13, 2022 in the Department of Civil Engineering of IIT Roorkee. The ceremony was graced by the presence of Prof. Manorajan Parida, Prof. Praveen Kumar; course coordinators and other senior professors.While considering the earlier road safety courses that were organized by IIT Roorkee in the year 2021,Prof. Manoranjan Parida, Deputy Director, IIT Roorkee, said,“The need of having more such programs for creating road safety auditors in joint association with IRC and MoRTH in this course will further escalate the participation in the next course and we shall reach bigger heights and make our roads safer.”

 Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IITRoorkee), organized the fourth 15-days training program on Road Safety Audit from May 30, 2022 to June 13, 2022, in association with Indian Roads Congress (IRC) and the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH). The program is a part of the road safety initiative taken up by the Government of India to have a pool of well-trained road safety auditors in the country.

IIT Roorkee Organizes The Fourth Road Safety Auditors Certification Course	

Roorkee (The Hawk): Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT Roorkee), collaborates for yet another mega event setting a benchmark in the era of SMART policing. Marking the second edition of Uttarakhand Police Hackathon, Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon 2.0, Uttarakhand Police today conducted the launch of the website of the mega event Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon at its headquarters in Dehradun.The website has been developed under the aegis of IIT Roorkee and Uttarakhand Police.&nbsp;Shri Ashok Kumar, Director General of Police, Uttarakhand inaugurated the website, during the event. The mega event was graced by the participation of State senior police officials, MHA officials, Prof. Ajit K Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee and Mahindra team. Prof. P Sateesh Kumar Peddoju and Prof. Akshay Dvivedi from IIT Roorkee are coordinators of the event.IIT Roorkee is not only the knowledge partner for the event but also an organizing partner. The event is being conducted in three stages, viz., prelims, which marks the launch of the website and initiation of registration for submitting solutions and ideas, following which there will be stages along a timeline for mains and the prize distribution ceremony.The need for Hackathon for finding technological solutions has now and then been stressed by the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India. Thus, Uttarakhand Police with utmost zeal and a commitment to meeting the goal of SMART policing conducted the first successful Cyber Hackathon in the state of Uttarakhand, Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon. Therefore, becoming the 1st state In North India to do so. Continuing in the same vein, the second edition of Uttarakhand Police Hackathon, Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon 2.0, is being conducted in collaboration with IIT Roorkee.While shedding some light on the event, Sh. Ashok Kumar, Director General of Police, Uttarakhand, said,"following the vision of Smart Policing of Hon'ble Prime Minister, about 332 teams from across the country participated in the first edition of DEVBHOOMI CYBER HACKATHON organized by Uttarakhand Police last year. This year we are planning to organize the same event in which IIT ROORKEE is the Knowledge Partner and Tech Mahindra is the Industrial Partner. In the last 01-02 years Uttarakhand Cyber Police has done commendable work and now it is committed to find innovative technological solutions which will act as benchmark and shape smart policing. This year we will have the participation of industry experts along with the students. I extend my best wishes to all the participants.”Prof. Ajit K Chaturvedi, Director, IIT Roorkee, said, “Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon 2.0 is the way forward for SMART policing as it will take up the challenge to identify and track criminals who exploit vulnerabilities in cybersecurity.”

 Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT Roorkee), collaborates for yet another mega event setting a benchmark in the era of SMART policing. Marking the second edition of Uttarakhand Police Hackathon, Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon 2.0, Uttarakhand Police today conducted the launch of the website of the mega event Devbhoomi Cyber Hackathon at its headquarters in Dehradun.