A group of students of the College of Engineering, Thiruvananthapuram (CET), pursuing diverse streams of engineering, have joined hands to give shape to a collective that aims at designing projects that have direct relevance for society.
ENCRESE, which stands for Engineers’ Crew for Society and Environment, comprise students who were brought together by the National Service Scheme (NSS) unit at CET.
Idea
“Inspired by the prime objective of the NSS to identify and address the problems of the community, we stumbled upon the idea of focusing our skills towards finding practical solutions for such issues,” says K. Sayanth, a sixth-semester Mechanical Engineering student, adding that efforts to get the society registered were on.
M.P. Abdul Rasheed, C. Mohammed Musadhiq, A. Mufil Rahman (Mechanical engineering students), P. Mohammed Niyaz (Industrial engineering), and S. Gopikrishnan (Civil Engineering) are the other members of ENCRESE.
Manual scavenging
As its first challenge, the group has taken up the problem of manual scavenging, a practice that persisted in several parts of the country, despite being prohibited. The collective has designed a ‘Manhole Sludge Removal System’ for removing sewer sediments. It envisages the use of four scoops, each having a capacity of three litres, that are hinged to rails and fixed to a frame that rotates to enable the collection of sediments. It will also have an electronically controlled driving system. The group’s efforts to fabricate the proposed equipment received a shot in the arm with ENCRESE emerging first at a competition organised recently by the Ex-Service Officers’ Association to design low-cost waste management technologies.
Furthering their mission to serve the society, the collective has launched yet another initiative, DeCARE, in association with Pallium India. According to Mr. Gopikrishnan, the programme aims at devising engineering solutions to assist persons with disabilities. The students have already gathered seven proposals, including a system to lift wheelchairs, ADL (Activity of Daily Living) gadgets for feeding and holding purposes, and easily controllable doors.
DeCARE was formally launched by Pallium India chairman and Padma Sri award recipient M.R. Rajagopal at a function held on the college campus recently.
