Category: Women / Girls

** India’s first woman psychiatrist, Sarada Menon, passes away at 98

She founded the Schizophrenia Research Foundation in 1984

Sarada Menon, the longest-serving head of the Institute of Mental Health, died in Chennai on Sunday. She was 98.

Born in Mangaluru, she had her education in Chennai. She was a graduate of the Madras Medical College and did her psychiatry training at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences in Bengaluru.

She is the country’s first woman psychiatrist and was honoured with Padma Bhushan in 1992. She founded the Schizophrenia Research Foundation (SCARF India) in 1984 along with psychiatrist R. Thara. “Her death has left a huge void in our lives. I have known her since 1978 and worked with her for 35 years. A great role model and inspiration to all of us. So human at many levels. Until three months ago, she was talking about her passion, the rehabilitation of the mentally ill,” Dr. Thara recalled.

** IIT Bombay: Breeding geniuses by the lakeside

Compared to the first girl — Tejaswini Saraf (1966 batch) — who turned heads at IIT-B, being the lone female student among 300 boys, today the situation is different with 20-25 per cent female students on the campus.

As the President of the IIT-B Alumni Association (IITBAA), Deepak Patil, says, at IITs, the mind is trained not only academically, but also to think deeply, rationally, to handle any problem, to go to the root and evolve a logical solution.

IITBAA Chairman Girish Nayak says IIT education makes the student sharper and analytical, trains them overall to solve any kind of problems, grapple any challenges in life without getting surprised or overwhelmed, and this is something that stays with them forever.

A few of the many notables who have passed out of IIT-B over the past six decades are: BSE MD & CEO Ashish Chauhan, Syntel founder Bharat Desai, Infosys Co-founder Nandan Nilekani, Twitter Inc. CEO Parag Agrawal, Senior Advocate Colin Gonsalves, ex-BMC Commissioner Jairaj Phatak, ex-Union minister Jairam Ramesh, late Goa CM Manohar Parrikar, mathematician Ravindran Kannan, ex-Dean of Harvard Business School Nitin Nohria, economist Ajit Ranade, and ex-President of Bell Labs Arun Netravali, among others.

** Gita Gopinath to take on new role at IMF as First Deputy Managing Director

Indian-American Gita Gopinath, the chief economist of International Monetary Fund, is being promoted as IMF’s First Deputy Managing Director, the fund announced Thursday.

She would replace Geoffrey Okamoto who plans to leave the Fund early next year. Gopinath, who was scheduled to return to her academic position at Harvard University in January 2022, has served as the IMF’s chief economist for three years.

** Udupi: Bantakal Engineering students win prizes in National Level Event ‘IEEE- EUREKA 2021’

The students of Shri Madhwa Vadiraja Institute of Technology and Management Bantakal have won first, second and third prize in ‘IEEE-EUREKA 2021’, a national level event organized by the IEEE Pune section.

Stream 1: ‘Technologies for Environment, Climate Change and Natural disasters’ Team: Aniketh Shenoy, Anjali Shet, M Sowmitha Pai, Vikram G Thunga. (First Prize)

Stream 2: ‘Technologies for Rural Development and Woman Welfare’ Team: S Sinchana, Shreya Nayak, Vaishak Prabhu, Vivek Shenoy. (First Prize)

Stream 3: ‘Technologies for Agriculture and Food Processing’ Team: Shriraksha, Ramya Deshpande, Shreya M Thantry, Rahamathunnisa. (Second Prize)

Stream 1: ‘Technologies for Environment, Climate Change and Natural disasters’ Team: Sarvesh S P, Varalakshmi, Varshini Acharya, Yashaswini R Amin.

** Ethiopia’s Tigray conflict has impacted an unlikely group—hundreds of Indian professors

Indian educators have historically played an important role in Ethiopia, Robert Shetkintong, India’s Ambassador in Addis Ababa, told indianexpress.com.

** Girl from UP wins award for developing app for soil identification

Nandini Kushwaha has been awarded for devising a smart data-based AI tool that identifies the most suitable crop for soil by analysing the various nutritional components present in it.