College of Engg, Pune students win third prize in DRDO Robotics and Unmanned Systems Exposition

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Pune – The city based lab R&DE(E), a premier laboratory of DRDO organized a nation-wide DRUSE finale and award ceremony on 24-25 May 2018. R&DE(E) has been working in the area of robotics & Unmanned systems for almost a decade and have developed a number of systems for military and para-military forces. DRUSE (DRDO Robotics and Unmanned Systems Exposition) is designed to serve as an open platform to popularize and synergize the national talent in the area of robotics amongst student community for development of Unmanned Systems for defence applications.

Out of 1088 teams from across country, 162 teams qualified in the first round. In the second round of evaluation, thirty teams qualified, who were evaluated by a high level expert committee chaired by Dr Vijay P Bhatkar on 24 May 2018.

DRUSE award ceremony was held on 25 May 2018, where the top 3 national winners were felicitated by chief guest Dr S Christopher, Chairman DRDO & Secretary Dept of Defence R&D. Dr G Athithan DG (MED&CoS), Dr (Mrs) Hina Gokhale, VC DIAT, Shri PK Mehta, DG (ACE) and Shri VV Parlikar Director R&DE(E) graced the occasion. A compendium showcasing the concepts/ideas of the qualified teams, was unveiled by the dignitaries.

A 6 wheeled robot known as ‘AYUDA’ for soldier assistance and surveillance, developed by a team from MES College of Engineering, Malappuram, Kerala, won the first prize worth Rs One Lakh and Fifty Thousand. The team consisting of Fazila Salim, Suraj K, Faris T, Basith KV with team leader KK Dibu was led by team guide Dr Maya G from the college.

IIT Kharagpur team’s concept of ‘Multi Terrain Heterogeneous Swarm’ proposed for surveillance of multi-storey buildings won the second prize worth Rs. one Lakh. The team from College of Engg (COEP), Pune won the third prize worth Rs. fifty thousand. The COEP team had proposed ‘Compressed Air Powered Human Exoskeleton Suit’.

The teams were all enthusiastic and came out with lot of innovative ideas and concepts. DRUSE was launched on 14 Oct 2017 and within a short span of seven months, the participating teams could visualize and develop innovative solutions to the defence applications as projected by DRDO.