College of Engineering, Pune
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A backgrounder
Dipanita Nath, March 26, 2023: The Indian Express
In his brief time at the College of Engineering, Pune, (COEP), the powerhouse actor Atul Kulkarni had heard a story that indicated the heritage of the place that he was in. “One of our departments had a huge boiler. The college got a notice from the British firm that had manufactured it that the 100-year guarantee for the boiler had now lapsed,” recalls Kulkarni, who would leave COEP after a year.
COEP is the third oldest engineering institute in Asia. Today, a lot has changed on campus – the boiler, for instance, has been retired – but the buildings constructed during the reign of Queen Victoria still watch over thousands of new engineers.
The origins
College of Engineering, Pune, is now called COEP Technological University (COEP), having gained autonomy in 2003. It was bestowed university status in June 2023 and is functional as a university. “We have a vision for the institute but also for the nation…COEP as a technological university is progressing steadily towards its goal to excel in the field of technical education,” says Vice-Chancellor M S Sutaone. COEP’s origins can be traced back to 1823 when the British government decided to give Indians an opportunity to train in civil works. By July 1854, the initiative had evolved into the Poona Engineering Class and Mechanical School, located in Bhawani Peth, comprising three houses as classrooms and a separate accommodation for the principal. The school aimed to educate junior officers of the Public Works Department.
It would be 11 years before the institute would get one of its most important heads, Theodore Cooke. He held office for 28 years and oversaw the growth of the college, including the laying of the foundation stone by Governor Bartie Frere in 1865 and the shift to the new buildings in 1868. The main building, designed by W S Howard, is a heritage site. At this time, the college was affiliated to the University of Bombay and had separate facilities for students who had passed matriculation. In 1879, the ambit of the college was expanded to include classes in Agriculture and Forest and the name, accordingly, was changed to College of Science. It was only in 1911 that another renaming would take place and the city would get the College of Engineering Poona. The affiliation was transferred from Bombay to the University of Pune.
In keeping with the times, the first departments were civil, mechanical and electrical, created in 1908, 1912 and 1932, respectively. The youngest department, computers, was established in 2022.
When the main building turned 150 in 2015, the institute celebrated by introducing liberal courses, allowing students to enrol in classes as varied as political science, holistic health, French and German to clay art and pottery, painting, and films. “Then, there is the Applied Sciences Department, which includes all the first-year courses – physics, biology and chemistry – as well as a Management Department. These are part of the School of Transdisciplinary Science and Management,” says COEP Public Relation Officer Snehal Hirve.
Illustrious alumni
A large graffiti outside COEP reminds all who pass that this was the alma mater of one of India’s greatest engineers, Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya, after whom Engineers’ Day is celebrated on September 15. Visvesvaraya’s contributions include the Krishna Raja Sagar Dam on the Cauvery river in Mysuru, the largest reservoir in Asia at the time; setting up a system to control the devastating floods of Hyderabad in the 1920s; as well as the automatic water floodgates installed at Khadakwasala reservoir in 1903. Visvesvaraya was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1955. Hub of innovations
At COEP, the work on innovations is continuing. When ISRO was sending the PICO satellite, weighing less than 1 kg, to space in 2015, students of COEP collaborated on its design. Among their other creations are a bomb detection and disposal robot and an app for Khelo India Youth Games 2019 in Pune. During the pandemic, students also developed low-cost mechanical ventilators, face shields, multipurpose contact-less keychains and masks, among others.
Outside the classrooms
While the Regatta at COEP has become a Pune tradition, the campus is also home to 48 clubs, ranging from the History Club, Debate and Quiz Club, Astronomy Club, Personality Development Club and Science Club to Janeev Club (derived from Marathi for consciousness), which sensitises students about social and environmental issues, Philomystics Club, which organises lectures by eminent people, Robotics Club, which participates in the annual Robocon as well as holds workshops for students, and the oldest technical club of the institute, the HAM Club, which is responsible for workshops in several colleges.
One of the vibrant spaces here is the Bhau Institute, which houses the Startup Incubation Centre that is driven by passion. Bhau’s E-Cell runs the annual Startup Fest, where various events are designed to bring students closer to industry and provide them with resources and networks.
Another important centre is Mitr, which focuses on the mental health and well-being of students caught in high-pressure academics. Set up in 2019, the centre provides psychological and related interventions and became an important support to students after the pandemic.
The COEP events calendar is dotted with other festivals as well, such as Mindspark, which is an annual national-level tech fest; the winter cultural extravaganza called Impressions; the COEP TedEx, a day-long dive into ideas for enhancement of the self and society; and various sports tournaments. The institute holds four Guinness World Records – skipping on a single rope by 292 students (2007), longest painting (2008), most people solving Rubik’s Cube (2012), and largest floating image (2016).
