Civil engineers celebrate 90th birthday of the Concrete Guru
Pune, September 28, 2019 : Prof. M. S. Shetty, the Guru in Concrete Technology who trained lacks of civil engineers through his lectures and books from more than last 30 years, turned 90 recently.
To mark this occasion, the Pune and Mumbai centre of Indian Concrete Institute (ICI) and Pune Chapter of Indian Geotechnical Society had jointly organized a unique one-day conference ‘Future of Concrete’ where different aspects of modern concrete technology were discussed. In the event, Shetty was felicitated at the hands of Lt. Gen Michael Mathews, Commandant, College of Military Engineering (CME).
Ujjwal Kunte, Chairman, Indian Concrete Institute (ICI), Pune, Prasad Sevekari, Secretary, ICI, Pune, Ramesh Kulkarni, Ex-President, Indian Geotechnical Society, Pune Chapter, Vivek Naik, Ex-President, ICI, Vishal Thombre, Secretary, ICI, Mumbai, R.T. Kulkarni, Entrepreneur were present among the dignitaries. Number of established engineers and entrepreneurs who were trained by M. S. Shetty attended this conference held at Sheraton Grand, Pune on Wednesday. Architect Priya Gokhale compered the event.
In the seminars, various topics including use of modern materials for durability and sustainability of concrete structures, models for service life prediction of concrete, 3-D printing of concrete and environmental and economic impact etc. were explained by eminent speakers in this field.
Stressing on the subject, Prof. Shetty said, ‘‘Concrete is all pervading material and is important in the big change taken place in the country in last 70 years. Concrete contains cement and cement is not very environment friendly material. But now, the materials like fly ash are used as a substitute for cement that impacts the quality of concrete. In India, millions of tons of fly ash is generated from the thermal plants, which is a burden for environment. From last 30 to 50 years, we have started replacing certain percentage of cement with fly ash. Modern concrete technologies aim to make it a greener material.’’
Lt. Gen. Mathews praised Prof. Shetty for his visionary approach towards this field and his inspiring attitude in his long career of 65 years.
