hi,

welcome to nidesign egroup. I am sudhir sharma and i moderate this group.
I was in NID during 1983-1989 time and then started elephant design with four
other graduates.

It will be very nice if u can post a brief introduction of yr self on the group
as yr first message. Where are u, what are u doing, when were u at nid and any
issues u may want to disscuss. this will help yr batch mates and friends to know
that u are there and others to know u.

Also chk out pictures, update yr address in database phonebook as well as take
part in Polls. You have a choice of not recieving mails in yr mailbox and chk
them online...if u need any help on this count let me know.

thank you once again and keep posting messages.

regards
sudhir sharma

----- Original Message -----

From: oni sen

To: nidesign@...

Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2003 11:34 AM

Subject: Re: [nidesign] SLPEP

Well... Kamal .. I faced the same problem.

The way to bypass it is to apply for ECNR with help of "last 3 years income-tax statement".

NID graduation not being accepted is silly but a reality!! Never understood the reason though... probably because it is a Diploma!!

Oni

---

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Hey Guys,
Theres a nice coverage of Satish (photu votu ke saath) in Pune TOI today.
See it if you get a chance.
- Kamal

Hi Guys,
I had posted this mail initially to Sudhir only. Just forwarding it to all
you guys.
Please let me know if any of you have also faced this. I dont have a
solution as yet to it - but lets try and work something out.
- Kamal


Sudhir,

Hi! This is a little out of the discussion which is why I am not posting
this to the group mail id. I gave my passport for renewal and removal of the
ECR stamp. When I gave the NID certificate, I was told that this is not
valid and will have to live with ECR stamp on the passport till I can
produce any other "valid" degree certificate. Do you know of anyone who has
countered this successfully ? Not that it matters to have the stamp on the
passport ... I just felt like reacting to the passport officers ignorance on
the education status of persons like me.

Regards,

Kamal

> were told (i think iread it somewhere as well) that UNDP recognised
> this diploma at par with post graduation in Unviversity...(Can
> someone confirm this)

I don't know about the UNDP, but the UPSC in India definitely
recognised the SLPEP Diploma as a PG-equivalent qualification.

> Also when John( Lucksom) was joining Telco..there was some issue of
> him to be treated as a post graduate at par with IDC post
> graduates...i guess it does matter in the hierarchy in Industry and
> does effect the role and responsibility, say in important
> matters..and ofcourse effects the pay packet as well.

It does affect career prospects in a BIG way. John was finally
considered as a PG by Tata Engineering (which set a precedent
by which I benefited when I joined the same company two years later).
Recently, our team was considering hiring a few people from NID/IDC.
Upon going through the NID web page, we discovered at NID itself
had derated its own SLPEP Diploma to a Graduate-level qualification.
I am not sure if UPSC updated their records on this. I was left with
no case to argue that if we took in a NID SLPEP Diploma holder,
he/she could join the company at the same grade as an IDC M.Des from
Mumbai or Delhi. I cannot comment on the reasons for which NID chose
to do this ("polytechnic" syndrome ?), but they certainly reduced
the incentive for any of their SLPEP graduates who may have thought
of joining the automobile industry. A single grade difference
at the working level in such organisations is quite important when
it comes to your credibility - designers being an outspoken bunch
would be trying to push the envelope anyway.  Not much help, this
derated SLPEP dip.

-JS-

I definitely feel that people who did the 5 year or 5
year plus SLPEP should consider themselves
post-graduates. I have, for the longest time, been
putting my educational background on my résumé as
'Master of Design, Communication Design, NID, 1995'.
Most IDC grads I have interacted with did a 3 year
degree followed by two years at IDC which works out to
5 years, so in my mind there is really no issue of
considering NID's 5 year course an undergraduate
degree!

Not to mention that our education was solidly of the
postgraduate level- I never found any value in
pursuing a Master's degree in the US because there was
not really anything new to learn in academic terms. In
a nutshell I would say the old SLPEP and AEPEP were on
par in terms of both being post-graduate programs.

Now as far as the new 4 year SLPEP goes, I am not not
sure where that stands. A lot of professional
undergraduate courses in India are 4 years, and you
need 12+4 years of education to be accepted as having
the equivalent of a bachelor's degree in most
countries including the US. So I guess that leaves a
question mark hanging over it.

My 2 cents (or Re. 1) worth!

Deepa


--- Sudhir Sharma <sudhirelephant@...> wrote:
> I am not sure about the facts here but when our
> batch graduated in
> 1989 after 5.5 years at NID...and we did what is
> called slpep now- we
> were told (i think iread it somewhere as well) that
> UNDP recognised
> this diploma at par with post graduation in
> Unviversity...(Can
> someone confirm this)
>
> Also when John( Lucksom) was joining Telco..there
> was some issue of
> him to be treated as a post graduate at par with IDC
> post
> graduates...i guess it does matter in the hierarchy
> in Industry and
> does effect the role and responsibility, say in
> important
> matters..and ofcourse effects the pay packet as
> well.
>
> anyone with clarity on this issue? designers at
> Industry
>
> and what now with NID having post graduate courses,
> AEP and SLPEP
> courses...along with many one week courses.
>
> sudhir
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --- In nidesign@..., "Jayant S"
> <sankbaba@y...> wrote:
> > Having met M P Ranjan in May last and having spent
> three highly
> > engrossing hours with him during which he shared
> some very detailed
> > documentation of this coursework with me, I must
> say that regardless
> > of status or recognition, he is one of those who
> has continued
> > believing in some of the core objectives of NID
> all these years,
> > and has continued to build upon what is now a
> clear legacy.
> >
> > I visited the campus last year, and Tata
> Engineering does have
> > a formal interaction running with NID at most
> times, so we get
> > to know how things are there now, particularly in
> the context
> > of what Arvind describes as a "Polytechnic".
> >
> > One of the things which I consider a retrogade
> step (this is only
> > my opinion) is the definition of SLPEP Diploma
> holders
> as "graduates"
> > and AEP students as "post-graduates". I am not
> sure why this one
> > came in. It means that if SLPEP graduates want to
> join industry,
> > established HR norms will see them coming in a
> grade lower in
> > the hierarchy than M.Des qualifiers from IDC
> Mumbai or Delhi. I
> > do not want to start a "war of the institutes"
> here, but I do
> > believe that NID SLPEP grads (and by exposure to
> the ambience - the
> > AEPs too) do have a component to their
> problem-solving and cognition
> > skills which are not prioritised at the IITs, and
> are hence missing
> > in their alumni by and large (in turn, IIT-IDC
> qualifiers have
> > some skill sets which are less evident with NID
> grads).
> >
> > The problem here is - by downgrading the SLPEP
> course, NID has seen
> > to it that fewer SLPEP grads will join heavy
> industry. There are
> some
> > positive advantages industry would have gained
> from this, which is
> > opportunity lost. I believe that all industrial
> design teams should
> > contain some component which is free from the
> conditioning that
> > comes from orthodox engineering backgrounds (this
> may seem an
> > offensive viewpoint to some here, it is not
> intended to be so as I
> > am not comparing "designer value" as such !). The
> result is going to
> > show itself in a certain lack of out-of-the-box
> innovation and a
> > tendency to take narrower product contexts
> (manifesting as a
> > follow-the-herd design policy). Sure,
> form/colour/texture may well
> > be original, but is that all which defines "good"
> industrial
> design ?
> >
> > -JS-
>
>


__________________________________
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I am not sure about the facts here but when our batch graduated in
1989 after 5.5 years at NID...and we did what is called slpep now- we
were told (i think iread it somewhere as well) that UNDP recognised
this diploma at par with post graduation in Unviversity...(Can
someone confirm this)

Also when John( Lucksom) was joining Telco..there was some issue of
him to be treated as a post graduate at par with IDC post
graduates...i guess it does matter in the hierarchy in Industry and
does effect the role and responsibility, say in important
matters..and ofcourse effects the pay packet as well.

anyone with clarity on this issue? designers at Industry

and what now with NID having post graduate courses, AEP and SLPEP
courses...along with many one week courses.

sudhir






--- In nidesign@..., "Jayant S" <sankbaba@y...> wrote:
> Having met M P Ranjan in May last and having spent three highly
> engrossing hours with him during which he shared some very detailed
> documentation of this coursework with me, I must say that regardless
> of status or recognition, he is one of those who has continued
> believing in some of the core objectives of NID all these years,
> and has continued to build upon what is now a clear legacy.
>
> I visited the campus last year, and Tata Engineering does have
> a formal interaction running with NID at most times, so we get
> to know how things are there now, particularly in the context
> of what Arvind describes as a "Polytechnic".
>
> One of the things which I consider a retrogade step (this is only
> my opinion) is the definition of SLPEP Diploma holders
as "graduates"
> and AEP students as "post-graduates". I am not sure why this one
> came in. It means that if SLPEP graduates want to join industry,
> established HR norms will see them coming in a grade lower in
> the hierarchy than M.Des qualifiers from IDC Mumbai or Delhi. I
> do not want to start a "war of the institutes" here, but I do
> believe that NID SLPEP grads (and by exposure to the ambience - the
> AEPs too) do have a component to their problem-solving and cognition
> skills which are not prioritised at the IITs, and are hence missing
> in their alumni by and large (in turn, IIT-IDC qualifiers have
> some skill sets which are less evident with NID grads).
>
> The problem here is - by downgrading the SLPEP course, NID has seen
> to it that fewer SLPEP grads will join heavy industry. There are
some
> positive advantages industry would have gained from this, which is
> opportunity lost. I believe that all industrial design teams should
> contain some component which is free from the conditioning that
> comes from orthodox engineering backgrounds (this may seem an
> offensive viewpoint to some here, it is not intended to be so as I
> am not comparing "designer value" as such !). The result is going to
> show itself in a certain lack of out-of-the-box innovation and a
> tendency to take narrower product contexts (manifesting as a
> follow-the-herd design policy). Sure, form/colour/texture may well
> be original, but is that all which defines "good" industrial
design ?
>
> -JS-

Hi again,

i am giving a clarification here (under threat).

I am sorry if my request
to avoid forwards was rude or sounded arrogant.

here is the reason:
This group has started attracting a lot of forwarded junk mail.
thankfully the yahoo filters work. I have been weeding sex mails and
joke forwards -which do the routine rounds on email.

But any member is free to post any content as long as the content is
generated (typed) by him/her) or has a commentary on the content
forwarded. required files and attachemnts can ofcourse be forwarded.

Anyway you are the best judges of what we should have here, but do
avoid putting the group id on the mass mail systems (all that lands
up in my box!!).

My request to avoid forwards was not trigerred by any particular mail
posted on this group (definitely not yours Nat.)

do keep posting.
regards
sudhir

hi all,

just a request to please avoid forwarding mails, articles, jokes to
this group unless you have a point to make with your analysis.

Lets assume that most of us are very busy and respect each others
time.

thanks and regards
sudhir

To all designers-
There is going to be a really large and interesting Design forum in
london during the design week in september.
This is a two and half day conference, and there will be speakers and
delegates from
all over.It will feature speakers from business, design, retail,
architecture, arts etc.Apart from the conference itself, the delegates
will be exposed to exhibitions,offsite events, european designwork.,
etc etc..... a really great coming together.

The British Council, are trying to promote the festival in
India and get participation and representation from here.If any of you
are interested you could log onto www.londondesignfestival.com- and you
would get a more comprehensive idea off the experience and offerings.
rabia

>>Salaam (Salute) to the Spirit of Mumbai !!!!!!
>>
>>The world renowned Forbes magazine has selected them as a colossal
>>example
>>of six sigma's success.
>>
>>Logistics at its best.
>>
>>The Mumbai Tiffinwallas are international figures now thanks to
>>Forbes Global. The Forbes story details the efficiency, which with
>>they delivers the Tiffin's of their customers. Around 5000
>>Tiffinwallas deliver 175,000 lunches everyday and take the empty
>>Tiffin back. They make one Error on every 16 million transactions.
>>
>>They make One Mistake in 2 months. This means there is one Error on
>>every 16 million transactions. This is thus a 6 Sigma performance
>>(a term used in quality assurance if the percentage of correctness
>>is 99.999999) - the performance that has made companies like
>>Motorola world famous for their Quality.
>>
>>Following is the complete story from the Forbes Global Magazine -
>>
>>Mumbai's "tiffinwallahs" have achieved a level of service to which
>>Western businesses can only aspire! When the profit motive is given
>>free rein, anything is possible. To appreciate Indian efficiency at
>>its best, watch the tiffinwallahs at work.
>>
>>These are the men who deliver 175,000 lunches (or "Tiffin") each
>>day to offices and schools throughout Mumbai, the business capital
>>of India. Lunch is in a tin container consisting of a number of
>>bowls, each containing a separate dish, held together in a frame.
>>The meals are prepared in the homes of the people who commute into
>>Mumbai each morning and delivered in their own Tiffin carriers.
>>After lunch, the process is reversed. And what a process - in it's
>>complexity, the 5,000 tiffinwallahs make a mistake only about once
>>every two months, according to Ragunath Medge, 42, president of the
>>Mumbai Tiffinmen's Association.
>>
>>That's one error in every 8 million deliveries, or 16 million if
>>you include the return trip. "If we made 10 mistakes a month, no
>>one would use our service," says the craggily handsome Medge.
>>
>>How do they do it?
>>
>>The meals are picked up from commuters' homes in suburbs around
>>central Mumbai long after the commuters have left for work,
>>delivered to them on time, then picked up and delivered home before
>>the commuters return. Each Tiffin carrier has, painted on its top,
>>a number of symbols which identify where the carrier was picked up,
>>the originating and destination stations and the address to which
>>it is to be delivered.
>>
>>After the Tiffin carriers are picked up, they are taken to the
>>nearest railway station, where they are sorted according to the
>>destination station. Between 10:15 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. they are
>>loaded in crates onto the baggage cars of trains. At the
>>destination station they are unloaded by other Tiffinwallas and
>>re-sorted, this time according to street address and floor. The
>>100-kilogram crates of carriers, carried on tiffinwallahs'
>>heads, hand-wagons and cycles are delivered at 12:30 p.m., picked
>>up at 1:30 p.m., and returned where they came from.
>>
>>The charge for this extraordinary service is just 150 rupees
>>($3.33) per month, enough for the tiffinwallahs, who are mostly
>>self-employed,to make a good living. After paying Rs. 60 per crate
>>and Rs.120 per man per month to the Western Railway for transport,
>>the average Tiffinwallas clears about Rs.3,250. Of that sum, Rs. 10
>>goes to the Tiffinmen's Association. After minimal expenses, the
>>rest of the Rs.50,000 a month that the Association collects go to a
>>charitable trust that feeds the poor.
>>
>>Superb service and charity too. Can anyone ask for more?
>>
>>What is wonderful about this system is that it extends the design
>>and uses the Tiffinwallas, the end user and their cognitive and
>>memory structure as well. Since one Tiffinwallas is not going to
>>pick more than 10-20 Tiffin, he can easily sort recognize at the
>>originating station and deliver it to the owner. Also within a
>>building, the Tiffinwala knows which floor to deliver. Within a
>>floor a owner can recognize his Tiffin amongst others.
>>
>>Thus these Tiffins carry only * A symbol (not name) of the
>>originating station * A symbol for the destination station* A
>>symbol for the building where the addressee is. And what is more
>>amazing is that this is run by people, most of whom are not that
>>literate.
>>
>>
>>- Source - Forbes Global Magazine
>>
>>Salaam (Salute) to the Spirit of Mumbai !!!!!!


=====
deepankar bhattacharyya
phone  : 9810586574,   +91-11-29815956
mail to : deepankar_bhatta@...

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com

hi.

i had posted my introduction a few days ago, or at least i thought i had,
in any case it appears to have got misplaced somewhere and will no doubt turn
up when one is not looking, so here goes, again.

i am deepankar bhattacharyya, 1st batch NID 1970-76.
i am based in Delhi and run Images Communication Services.
we work mainly in the area of visual communications and exhibitions.

we also do print production and execution of exhibitions for
advertising agencies and independant designers, should they require this
service on their design projects.

i am happy to join the nidesign e-community and look forward to much interaction
in the future.

=====
deepankar bhattacharyya
phone  : 9810586574,   +91-11-29815956
mail to : deepankar_bhatta@...

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com

Having met M P Ranjan in May last and having spent three highly
engrossing hours with him during which he shared some very detailed
documentation of this coursework with me, I must say that regardless
of status or recognition, he is one of those who has continued
believing in some of the core objectives of NID all these years,
and has continued to build upon what is now a clear legacy.

I visited the campus last year, and Tata Engineering does have
a formal interaction running with NID at most times, so we get
to know how things are there now, particularly in the context
of what Arvind describes as a "Polytechnic".

One of the things which I consider a retrogade step (this is only
my opinion) is the definition of SLPEP Diploma holders as "graduates"
and AEP students as "post-graduates". I am not sure why this one
came in. It means that if SLPEP graduates want to join industry,
established HR norms will see them coming in a grade lower in
the hierarchy than M.Des qualifiers from IDC Mumbai or Delhi. I
do not want to start a "war of the institutes" here, but I do
believe that NID SLPEP grads (and by exposure to the ambience - the
AEPs too) do have a component to their problem-solving and cognition
skills which are not prioritised at the IITs, and are hence missing
in their alumni by and large (in turn, IIT-IDC qualifiers have
some skill sets which are less evident with NID grads).

The problem here is - by downgrading the SLPEP course, NID has seen
to it that fewer SLPEP grads will join heavy industry. There are some
positive advantages industry would have gained from this, which is
opportunity lost. I believe that all industrial design teams should
contain some component which is free from the conditioning that
comes from orthodox engineering backgrounds (this may seem an
offensive viewpoint to some here, it is not intended to be so as I
am not comparing "designer value" as such !). The result is going to
show itself in a certain lack of out-of-the-box innovation and a
tendency to take narrower product contexts (manifesting as a
follow-the-herd design policy). Sure, form/colour/texture may well
be original, but is that all which defines "good" industrial design ?

-JS-

hi arun
nice to re-visit some of those bucky fullerish utterings from you.
regards.
din
________________________________________________________________________

Message: 3
    Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:37:49 +1000
    From: "Arun Khanna" <arun@...>
Subject: Re: Design in the Real World: Ranjan on the BusinessWorld Awards

Dear Ranjan,

Excellent!




---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.501 / Virus Database: 299 - Release Date: 14-07-03

Dear Ranjan,

Excellent!

How are you, Aditi and the family?

Over the last 25 years my experience has shown that the interface between
the design community and the clients, users and other professionals is the
most active zone for sowing self generating and self organising seeds for
the success of Design as a whole.
This hignly communicative space with state of the art infrastructure for
networking in the present day environment is the fertile soil for Extensible
Design. The success of all individual designers has been due to this
Extensibility of design knowledge which permeates into the Business to
Business and Business to Consumer space.
My orientation and education which I acquired through NID has been
invaluable and essential in my everyday existence ever since I started
Matrix with Sita and Pradeep. The basic attitudes and approaches we acquired
at NID have always broadened our canvas focused our perceptions and evolved
our thinking. No matter which industry or environment I have worked in
(physical or metaphysical, hardware or software) the challenge has been
Extensibility of Design into the real world- offering relevant and
evolutionary solutions.
No wonder Satish has done so well, he has not only designed 150 machines but
Extended design into that industry's Business and Consumer model. That
allows the rest of the designers to find a communication niche which he
pioneered to plugin. Therefore the success of disign can only be found in
that interface where it lives and thrives. NID can only be a nursery to
create the right genes for the seeds to be sown.
NID will always be recognised for the dedication of people like yourselves
through the successful growth of all those seeds which have got scattered
throughout the world and not only in India.
My support will always be there. Keep up the good work.
Let me know how I can help you from Downunder!

It was nice to hear from you.

Best Regards

Arun Khanna
Managing Director
Cadability Pty Ltd
303/suite 1 Stephensons Road
Mt. Waverley, Vic. 3149
Australia
Tel: +613 9807 8222
Mob: 0418 340 444

the home of interactive digital sports
www.cadability.com
the home of interactive Matchlets(tm)
www.howzat.net.au
www.sportsflash.com.au
----- Original Message -----
From: "M P Ranjan" <ranjanmp@...>
To: <nidesign@...>
Sent: Tuesday, July 22, 2003 1:42 AM
Subject: [nidesign] Design in the Real World: Ranjan on the BusinessWorld
Awards


> Dear friends of NID
>
> Here is my second post of the day. I have quoted below the paper that I
> have sent as an attachment to my letter to the Secretary Industries,
> Government of India and i is an analysis of the BusinessWorld-NID
> Design Excellence Award and a call for a recaliberation of NID in the
> context of the emerging need and global challange that will face all of
> us.
>
> Let us work together to place Design firmly in the Indian psyche and
> encourage and extend its use in all the sectors of our economy in the
> years ahead.
>
> With warm regards
>
> M P Ranjan
> from my office at NID
> 21 July 2003 at 9.05 pm IST
>
>
>
> Design in the Real World: The time has come to reposition NID.
>
> An open letter to the Secretary (IPP) Ministry of Commerce & Industry
> Government of India for taking stock of the status of Design in India
> and NID's position in the world of Indian higher education.
>
> Prof. M P Ranjan
> Faculty of Design
> and
> Head, NID Centre for Bamboo Initiatives
> National Institute of Design, Ahmedbad
>
> Views expressed in this paper are personal to the author and do not
> represent the views of the Institute in any way.
>
> Analysis of the first ever national design competition for design in
> corporate India is represented by the Businessworld-NID Design
> Excellence Award and as reported in the 30th June 2003 issue of
> Businessworld makes for some very interesting reading between the
> lines. The telecast of the event over the NDTV 24x7 channel yesterday
> provides further data on the participants and the winners across the
> categories of corporate design that were included in the awards list
> for this year. Six categories were announced for the awards, all
> largely dealing with the generally accepted area of new product
> creation through Industrial Design with the exception of FMCG
> Packaging, which is usually considered to be in the domain of the
> Graphic Designer or the Marketing wing of an Advertising Agency. The
> other five areas were for the Best - Indian Designer, Concept,
> Automobile - two and four wheeler, Consumer Durable and Lifestyle
> Product.
>
> The parade of award winners and the runners-up in all six categories
> make very interesting reading as most of them come from one fairly
> under-funded place called the National Institute of Design when
> compared to the giants of technology and science that have been set up
> all over India at an enormous cost over the past fifty years or so. Let
> us look at the details of the awardees and see whether or not the
> statement above should raise some eyebrows in the corridors of power in
> the Government and Industry in India.
>
> Satish Gokhale, Design Directions, Pune and winner of the Best Indian
> Designer Award has produced over 140 machines to reach markets in 17
> countries and he is a graduate of NIDs undergraduate programme in
> Product Design. He is one person who has through his sustained work
> with industry produced wealth and value for Indian industry that could
> well equal or even surpasss that provided by many labs and departments
> in numerous technological establishments in India taken together and he
> is indeed a deserving candidate for the first ever Best Designer Award
> from the Businessworld-NID Design Excellence Award. The other runners-
> up for the coveted Award were Dilip Chhabria an Internationally trained
> car-stylist and Michael Foley another graduate of NID, again from the
> under-graduate programme in Product Design. That makes two out of the
> three of the very best that the country has to offer, come from the NID
> fold.
>
> The second category was for the Best Concept Design and none other than
> Neil Foley won it.  Yet another graduate from NIDs undergraduate
> programme in Product Design, Niel won hands down. Ironically all three
> designs short listed for the award were done by him so the count now is
> five of the six very best in the country came from NID and there is
> more to come!!
>
> The third category was for automobile design and the winners were Tata
> Indica and the Kinetic Nova and these successful products are complex
> and multi-disciplinary efforts spread over a number of years of
> research and design. The Tata Indica had a core team of Industrial
> Designers from NID who worked along with the Telco engineers and a firm
> of international consultants to deliver the final product. The details
> of the individual contributions are for the analysis of some future
> historian of design, but for now we can acknowledge a definite
> contribution from NID through its graduates working at Telco R&D. The
> Kinetic success story was headed by designer Ravinder S. Patil working
> closely with the MD of the company, Salujja Firodia Motwani, both non-
> NID players. However the Kinetic story had many levels of NID
> involvement as disclosed by the Chairman of the company in the NDTV
> telecast of the Award event and this is quoted below.
>
> The fourth category for the Best Consumer Durable all went to the
> multi-nationals with the winner position being taken by LG of Korea for
> the LG Art Cool Air-Conditioner and the runners-up were Amtrex-Hitachi
> Logicool i Air-Conditioner and the Phillips Diva, a dry iron for the
> Indian and Chinese markets designed at Phillips Design Centre at Pune.
> NID drew a blank in this category but let us read on.
>
> The fifth category was the Best Lifestyle Product and the award went to
> Edge, the world's slimmest watch produced by Titan Industries and the
> design once again is from a team led by an NID graduate from the
> undergraduate programme in Product Design, Michael Foley. The visionary
> management at Titan had placed the NID designers at the core of their
> product development strategy over the years and this enabled them to
> take on the giants of global business in this very competitive industry
> and carry the battle successfully into their territory as well. The
> runners-up in this category were Titan Fastrack from the Titan Design
> Studio that is a nest of NID designers from the very early stages of
> the company. The other contender was Carbon jewellery designed by a
> NIFT graduate in Accessory design under the guidance of an NID graduate
> Jatin Bhatt, who set up and also heads the department at NIFT and he
> has personally helped set the design strategy for the company who
> gratefully acknowledge this contribution today.
>
> In the last category it gets even more interesting. The Award goes to
> John Players shirts and the design of the innovative packaging is
> credited to Chittaranjan Dhar, MD of ITC Apparel Business. However
> behind the scenes I am told by a soft voice that NID Graduate Niladri
> Mukherjee of Whisper Design, New Delhi had conceived the product along
> with the entire retail identity for the company. The other contenders
> for the award were Himalaya Chavanprasaha designed by none other than
> Sujata Kesavan, Ray & Kesavan, Bangalore yet another NID graduate from
> the undergraduate programme in Graphic Design. Another contender for
> the category was Incubis headed by NID graduate Amit Krishn Gulati for
> their innovative packaging for Shriram Piston and Rings for an unusual
> product in this category
>
> So what is the final tally? NID designers win four of the six
> categories outright, In the automobile design category the NID
> designers are part of the company teams as acknowledged by the
> respective companies. That leaves out only one category of Consumer
> Durables which is a challenge that needs to be set right next year
> perhaps, and this should not be difficult for the NID designers to take
> on in partnership with Indian industry and this will be an eye-opener
> for the multinationals who are trying to set up shop in India in the
> emerging WTO mediated era. Further the runners up in all categories
> number six from NID out of a total of thirteen short-listed in all six
> categories.
>
> This is an enormous success by any standard for the NID educated design
> community to be able to shine so brightly through their singular
> achievements in the just concluded Businessworld-NID Design Excellence
> Awards which is the first ever publically available data on design
> excellence in India. I had advocated over many years that NID and our
> Ministry should get a national assessment done by some respected
> management consultancy organisation to assess and articulate the real
> contributions of our small design community in India that has been
> spawned by NID. However this plea had always fallen on deaf ears but
> now it is indeed gratifying and significant to note that in a
> population of over one billion Indians and in a pool of over twenty
> lakh strong trained technical manpower of India, all this success is
> coming from a very small institution in Ahmedabad. That the NID message
> is a powerful one cannot be overlooked any more and the Ministry of
> Industry should recaliberate its assessment of the NID as an
> Institution of National importance and of the NID Faculty as members of
> an elite establishment who are both effective and worthy of parity with
> the IITs and IIMs of this country. This will have a great and positive
> impact on trying to cull out the real values that this lesson holds for
> all of us in trying to preserve those values that have made NID a
> success in spite of its being small and fairly unconventional in its
> educational practises and experiments over the years. The pressure that
> is being placed on it to expand mindlessly due to some skewed financial
> logic holds a real danger of it loosing the very essence of its
> vitality that has been nurtured over the years. We need more
> experiments like NID and we need to boldly take stock of what we have
> and set a course for the future that includes that learning from the
> lessons of the past.
>
> Looking back at the string of NID successes over the years and at the
> particularly sharp distinction in this very significant national award
> one begins to wonder where all the investment into science and
> technology establishments have gone when it comes to the creation of
> cutting edge products for the competitive marketplace being addressed
> by corporate India today. Why do we not see enough products of
> excellence in the marketplace coming from the great technological and
> scientific giants set up all over the country at investments running
> into thousands of crores of Rupees of Government funding (One crore =
> 10 million). My answer to this question is that they too need to learn
> to use Design as an integral part of their work in the creation of new
> technologies and in directing science initiatives that are based on
> need and not on some whims of administrators or on some other esoteric
> pursuits. This will help bridge the gap that we see in the lab to land
> efforts of many technology-alone players we see all over the country.
> Even today as we read this so much more investments are pouring into
> the science and technology sectors and design and design education
> establishments are being undermined at the centre and at the periphery
> in India due to some mistaken notion that they, the former will deliver
> great results, while it is the latter who is now actually taking the
> cake in the Businessworld Awards of 2003, almost all of it to boot.
> This award is the first time that we have public data on the fact that
> Design, and of the kind championed at NID (not fashion or styling -
> both of which have their role to play and they attract enormous media
> coverage), can deliver results that India cannot afford to ignore.
>
> The area in which I have been personally working now for over twenty
> five years too suffers the same dilemma when it comes to funding from
> the government kitty. Our work at NID has demonstrated in a succinct
> manner that Bamboo holds the promise for the creation of millions of
> jobs and a ten thousand crore industry in India that is sustainable but
> we still have difficulty obtaining funding for our research and
> development initiatives in this very sector. The Government of India
> that has finally set up a National Bamboo Mission is working overtime
> to exclude Design through an unhealthy emphasis on science and
> technology alone through their channels in DST and TIFAC and one
> wonders when the design scene in India will change for the better. The
> Government practises Design by public tender, which is perhaps the
> worst way to do any design task, and the other method that is often
> used is "Design by Committee" so that nobody is responsible for the
> fiasco that follows. Design is sorely needed in all the sectors of our
> economy and the NID message must inform these initiatives if excellence
> and effectiveness with limited resources are our goals.
>
> Is there a message in these awards for the scientific and technological
> establishments represented by the IITs and the DST, the CSIR labs of
> India and the numerous educational and research establishments in
> corporate and the government sectors when it comes to the creation of
> new products for a competitive economy? Does the Ministry of Industry
> realise the value that has been produced at the National Institute of
> Design over the years? Yes indeed, they all need to adopt design as an
> active partner in all their initiatives if any success is to be
> achieved in the near future.
>
> In this extremely clear scenario that is emerging from the above
> analysis, one wonders why the NID has been left to literally languish
> due to lack of official supports when compared to the NIFTs that are
> under the Ministry of Textiles and the IITs and IIMs that are under the
> Ministry of Human Resources Development and the numerous scientific
> research establishments that are under the Department of Science and
> Technology and the CSIR etc all of which are far better funded than
> NID. Besides the absence of adequate funding on the magnitude of the
> sister organisations in fashion, technology and management, the NID
> faculty too are also at a continuing disadvantage, where its faculty
> are still not paid an appropriate salary scale or have the benefit of
> any incentive system that has parity with these organisations, a matter
> that is on demand from the NID faculty as a long outstanding dispute
> that is being ignored by the establishment due to the small size of the
> Institute in a democratic country like India where might is usually
> right. That the salary scale offered by the Fourth Pay Commission was
> accepted as an interim measure after much delay and this has been used
> by the Ministry and the officials that be to ignore this legitimate
> demand, and the matter has not been corrected for over twenty years
> now. It is under silent protest that the NID faculty had accepted that
> skewed interim measure and the call for parity with the IIMs and the
> IITs are a legitimate demand of the NID faculty that should be taken up
> at the highest levels of Government, particularly in the light of the
> demonstrated excellence of the NID contribution over the years in all
> sectors of the Indian economy. These demonstrations have been there all
> along as a silent achievement of a dedicated team of designers from the
> NID fold and the time has now come to recognise and reposition the
> Institute along with the best in the country, which I believe we are.
>
> The proof of this excellence is held in the impassioned comment by Shri
> Arun Firodia, Chairman, Kinetic Auto Ltd., Pune when he spoke at the
> Businesworld-NID Design Excellence Awards ceremony where he thanked NID
> and its graduates for the sustained help that had been rendered to his
> company in the form of high quality indigenous product design services
> over the past twenty five years while they were competing with others
> in the auto industry who chose the route of design transfer from
> overseas. He said "..thank you NID and the Arun Khannas and Pradeep
> Sinhas of NID for placing my company where it is today..".
>
> As a member of the faculty of NID for almost thirty years now this
> comes as no surprise but it is gratifying to finally see due
> recognition coming our way from this very public event.
>
> The magazine goes on to examine the global reach of Indian design and
> in this too NID graduates are featured. Uday Dandavate of Sonic Rim,
> USA calls for deep research into user-centered design research to
> identify the key features of a future product as against the usual
> tendency of our industry of investing in a massive advertising or
> market research which cannot help define the market potential of a
> future product that does not as yet exist. There are many areas and
> categories of critical design action that were not covered by the
> Businesworld-NID Design Excellence Awards this year. That design is a
> critical resource in as many as 230 sectors of the Indian economy is a
> looming fact and both Government and our Industry alike do not as yet
> understand this fully. This Businessworld initiative we do hope will
> change perceptions about the role of design in India that is not
> delayed too long. However this is a great beginning and I do hope that
> in the years ahead other sectors of design excellence too will be
> recognised and celebrated, particularly the enormous work that still
> needs to be done in the social and economic sectors that lie far
> outside the scope of the corporate world as it is narrowly defined
> today. This will then usher in the age of Design in the Real World, and
> the pun is intended.
>
> The Ministry of Industry should take cognisance of the message that we
> read from the awards under analysis and initiate measures to take stock
> of the potential and promise of the spread of design in India by
> numerous initiatives that may be needed and also take up the matter of
> setting right the parity issue between NID and the IITs and IIMs so
> that design will get its rightful position in the educational space as
> well as in the National economy in the years ahead. The NID faculty
> have waited patiently for all these years for due recognition and I
> hope that this wait is not in vain.
>
> ~
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
http://in.docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
>
>
>

Dear friends of NID

Here is my second post of the day. I have quoted below the paper that I
have sent as an attachment to my letter to the Secretary Industries,
Government of India and i is an analysis of the BusinessWorld-NID
Design Excellence Award and a call for a recaliberation of NID in the
context of the emerging need and global challange that will face all of
us.

Let us work together to place Design firmly in the Indian psyche and
encourage and extend its use in all the sectors of our economy in the
years ahead.

With warm regards

M P Ranjan
from my office at NID
21 July 2003 at 9.05 pm IST



Design in the Real World: The time has come to reposition NID.

An open letter to the Secretary (IPP) Ministry of Commerce & Industry
Government of India for taking stock of the status of Design in India
and NID's position in the world of Indian higher education.

Prof. M P Ranjan
Faculty of Design
and
Head, NID Centre for Bamboo Initiatives
National Institute of Design, Ahmedbad

Views expressed in this paper are personal to the author and do not
represent the views of the Institute in any way.

Analysis of the first ever national design competition for design in
corporate India is represented by the Businessworld-NID Design
Excellence Award and as reported in the 30th June 2003 issue of
Businessworld makes for some very interesting reading between the
lines. The telecast of the event over the NDTV 24x7 channel yesterday
provides further data on the participants and the winners across the
categories of corporate design that were included in the awards list
for this year. Six categories were announced for the awards, all
largely dealing with the generally accepted area of new product
creation through Industrial Design with the exception of FMCG
Packaging, which is usually considered to be in the domain of the
Graphic Designer or the Marketing wing of an Advertising Agency. The
other five areas were for the Best – Indian Designer, Concept,
Automobile – two and four wheeler, Consumer Durable and Lifestyle
Product.

The parade of award winners and the runners-up in all six categories
make very interesting reading as most of them come from one fairly
under-funded place called the National Institute of Design when
compared to the giants of technology and science that have been set up
all over India at an enormous cost over the past fifty years or so. Let
us look at the details of the awardees and see whether or not the
statement above should raise some eyebrows in the corridors of power in
the Government and Industry in India.

Satish Gokhale, Design Directions, Pune and winner of the Best Indian
Designer Award has produced over 140 machines to reach markets in 17
countries and he is a graduate of NIDs undergraduate programme in
Product Design. He is one person who has through his sustained work
with industry produced wealth and value for Indian industry that could
well equal or even surpasss that provided by many labs and departments
in numerous technological establishments in India taken together and he
is indeed a deserving candidate for the first ever Best Designer Award
from the Businessworld-NID Design Excellence Award. The other runners-
up for the coveted Award were Dilip Chhabria an Internationally trained
car-stylist and Michael Foley another graduate of NID, again from the
under-graduate programme in Product Design. That makes two out of the
three of the very best that the country has to offer, come from the NID
fold.

The second category was for the Best Concept Design and none other than
Neil Foley won it.  Yet another graduate from NIDs undergraduate
programme in Product Design, Niel won hands down. Ironically all three
designs short listed for the award were done by him so the count now is
five of the six very best in the country came from NID and there is
more to come!!

The third category was for automobile design and the winners were Tata
Indica and the Kinetic Nova and these successful products are complex
and multi-disciplinary efforts spread over a number of years of
research and design. The Tata Indica had a core team of Industrial
Designers from NID who worked along with the Telco engineers and a firm
of international consultants to deliver the final product. The details
of the individual contributions are for the analysis of some future
historian of design, but for now we can acknowledge a definite
contribution from NID through its graduates working at Telco R&D. The
Kinetic success story was headed by designer Ravinder S. Patil working
closely with the MD of the company, Salujja Firodia Motwani, both non-
NID players. However the Kinetic story had many levels of NID
involvement as disclosed by the Chairman of the company in the NDTV
telecast of the Award event and this is quoted below.

The fourth category for the Best Consumer Durable all went to the
multi-nationals with the winner position being taken by LG of Korea for
the LG Art Cool Air-Conditioner and the runners-up were Amtrex-Hitachi
Logicool i Air-Conditioner and the Phillips Diva, a dry iron for the
Indian and Chinese markets designed at Phillips Design Centre at Pune.
NID drew a blank in this category but let us read on.

The fifth category was the Best Lifestyle Product and the award went to
Edge, the world's slimmest watch produced by Titan Industries and the
design once again is from a team led by an NID graduate from the
undergraduate programme in Product Design, Michael Foley. The visionary
management at Titan had placed the NID designers at the core of their
product development strategy over the years and this enabled them to
take on the giants of global business in this very competitive industry
and carry the battle successfully into their territory as well. The
runners-up in this category were Titan Fastrack from the Titan Design
Studio that is a nest of NID designers from the very early stages of
the company. The other contender was Carbon jewellery designed by a
NIFT graduate in Accessory design under the guidance of an NID graduate
Jatin Bhatt, who set up and also heads the department at NIFT and he
has personally helped set the design strategy for the company who
gratefully acknowledge this contribution today.

In the last category it gets even more interesting. The Award goes to
John Players shirts and the design of the innovative packaging is
credited to Chittaranjan Dhar, MD of ITC Apparel Business. However
behind the scenes I am told by a soft voice that NID Graduate Niladri
Mukherjee of Whisper Design, New Delhi had conceived the product along
with the entire retail identity for the company. The other contenders
for the award were Himalaya Chavanprasaha designed by none other than
Sujata Kesavan, Ray & Kesavan, Bangalore yet another NID graduate from
the undergraduate programme in Graphic Design. Another contender for
the category was Incubis headed by NID graduate Amit Krishn Gulati for
their innovative packaging for Shriram Piston and Rings for an unusual
product in this category

So what is the final tally? NID designers win four of the six
categories outright, In the automobile design category the NID
designers are part of the company teams as acknowledged by the
respective companies. That leaves out only one category of Consumer
Durables which is a challenge that needs to be set right next year
perhaps, and this should not be difficult for the NID designers to take
on in partnership with Indian industry and this will be an eye-opener
for the multinationals who are trying to set up shop in India in the
emerging WTO mediated era. Further the runners up in all categories
number six from NID out of a total of thirteen short-listed in all six
categories.

This is an enormous success by any standard for the NID educated design
community to be able to shine so brightly through their singular
achievements in the just concluded Businessworld-NID Design Excellence
Awards which is the first ever publically available data on design
excellence in India. I had advocated over many years that NID and our
Ministry should get a national assessment done by some respected
management consultancy organisation to assess and articulate the real
contributions of our small design community in India that has been
spawned by NID. However this plea had always fallen on deaf ears but
now it is indeed gratifying and significant to note that in a
population of over one billion Indians and in a pool of over twenty
lakh strong trained technical manpower of India, all this success is
coming from a very small institution in Ahmedabad. That the NID message
is a powerful one cannot be overlooked any more and the Ministry of
Industry should recaliberate its assessment of the NID as an
Institution of National importance and of the NID Faculty as members of
an elite establishment who are both effective and worthy of parity with
the IITs and IIMs of this country. This will have a great and positive
impact on trying to cull out the real values that this lesson holds for
all of us in trying to preserve those values that have made NID a
success in spite of its being small and fairly unconventional in its
educational practises and experiments over the years. The pressure that
is being placed on it to expand mindlessly due to some skewed financial
logic holds a real danger of it loosing the very essence of its
vitality that has been nurtured over the years. We need more
experiments like NID and we need to boldly take stock of what we have
and set a course for the future that includes that learning from the
lessons of the past.

Looking back at the string of NID successes over the years and at the
particularly sharp distinction in this very significant national award
one begins to wonder where all the investment into science and
technology establishments have gone when it comes to the creation of
cutting edge products for the competitive marketplace being addressed
by corporate India today. Why do we not see enough products of
excellence in the marketplace coming from the great technological and
scientific giants set up all over the country at investments running
into thousands of crores of Rupees of Government funding (One crore =
10 million). My answer to this question is that they too need to learn
to use Design as an integral part of their work in the creation of new
technologies and in directing science initiatives that are based on
need and not on some whims of administrators or on some other esoteric
pursuits. This will help bridge the gap that we see in the lab to land
efforts of many technology-alone players we see all over the country.
Even today as we read this so much more investments are pouring into
the science and technology sectors and design and design education
establishments are being undermined at the centre and at the periphery
in India due to some mistaken notion that they, the former will deliver
great results, while it is the latter who is now actually taking the
cake in the Businessworld Awards of 2003, almost all of it to boot.
This award is the first time that we have public data on the fact that
Design, and of the kind championed at NID (not fashion or styling –
both of which have their role to play and they attract enormous media
coverage), can deliver results that India cannot afford to ignore.

The area in which I have been personally working now for over twenty
five years too suffers the same dilemma when it comes to funding from
the government kitty. Our work at NID has demonstrated in a succinct
manner that Bamboo holds the promise for the creation of millions of
jobs and a ten thousand crore industry in India that is sustainable but
we still have difficulty obtaining funding for our research and
development initiatives in this very sector. The Government of India
that has finally set up a National Bamboo Mission is working overtime
to exclude Design through an unhealthy emphasis on science and
technology alone through their channels in DST and TIFAC and one
wonders when the design scene in India will change for the better. The
Government practises Design by public tender, which is perhaps the
worst way to do any design task, and the other method that is often
used is "Design by Committee" so that nobody is responsible for the
fiasco that follows. Design is sorely needed in all the sectors of our
economy and the NID message must inform these initiatives if excellence
and effectiveness with limited resources are our goals.

Is there a message in these awards for the scientific and technological
establishments represented by the IITs and the DST, the CSIR labs of
India and the numerous educational and research establishments in
corporate and the government sectors when it comes to the creation of
new products for a competitive economy? Does the Ministry of Industry
realise the value that has been produced at the National Institute of
Design over the years? Yes indeed, they all need to adopt design as an
active partner in all their initiatives if any success is to be
achieved in the near future.

In this extremely clear scenario that is emerging from the above
analysis, one wonders why the NID has been left to literally languish
due to lack of official supports when compared to the NIFTs that are
under the Ministry of Textiles and the IITs and IIMs that are under the
Ministry of Human Resources Development and the numerous scientific
research establishments that are under the Department of Science and
Technology and the CSIR etc all of which are far better funded than
NID. Besides the absence of adequate funding on the magnitude of the
sister organisations in fashion, technology and management, the NID
faculty too are also at a continuing disadvantage, where its faculty
are still not paid an appropriate salary scale or have the benefit of
any incentive system that has parity with these organisations, a matter
that is on demand from the NID faculty as a long outstanding dispute
that is being ignored by the establishment due to the small size of the
Institute in a democratic country like India where might is usually
right. That the salary scale offered by the Fourth Pay Commission was
accepted as an interim measure after much delay and this has been used
by the Ministry and the officials that be to ignore this legitimate
demand, and the matter has not been corrected for over twenty years
now. It is under silent protest that the NID faculty had accepted that
skewed interim measure and the call for parity with the IIMs and the
IITs are a legitimate demand of the NID faculty that should be taken up
at the highest levels of Government, particularly in the light of the
demonstrated excellence of the NID contribution over the years in all
sectors of the Indian economy. These demonstrations have been there all
along as a silent achievement of a dedicated team of designers from the
NID fold and the time has now come to recognise and reposition the
Institute along with the best in the country, which I believe we are.

The proof of this excellence is held in the impassioned comment by Shri
Arun Firodia, Chairman, Kinetic Auto Ltd., Pune when he spoke at the
Businesworld-NID Design Excellence Awards ceremony where he thanked NID
and its graduates for the sustained help that had been rendered to his
company in the form of high quality indigenous product design services
over the past twenty five years while they were competing with others
in the auto industry who chose the route of design transfer from
overseas. He said "..thank you NID and the Arun Khannas and Pradeep
Sinhas of NID for placing my company where it is today..".

As a member of the faculty of NID for almost thirty years now this
comes as no surprise but it is gratifying to finally see due
recognition coming our way from this very public event.

The magazine goes on to examine the global reach of Indian design and
in this too NID graduates are featured. Uday Dandavate of Sonic Rim,
USA calls for deep research into user-centered design research to
identify the key features of a future product as against the usual
tendency of our industry of investing in a massive advertising or
market research which cannot help define the market potential of a
future product that does not as yet exist. There are many areas and
categories of critical design action that were not covered by the
Businesworld-NID Design Excellence Awards this year. That design is a
critical resource in as many as 230 sectors of the Indian economy is a
looming fact and both Government and our Industry alike do not as yet
understand this fully. This Businessworld initiative we do hope will
change perceptions about the role of design in India that is not
delayed too long. However this is a great beginning and I do hope that
in the years ahead other sectors of design excellence too will be
recognised and celebrated, particularly the enormous work that still
needs to be done in the social and economic sectors that lie far
outside the scope of the corporate world as it is narrowly defined
today. This will then usher in the age of Design in the Real World, and
the pun is intended.

The Ministry of Industry should take cognisance of the message that we
read from the awards under analysis and initiate measures to take stock
of the potential and promise of the spread of design in India by
numerous initiatives that may be needed and also take up the matter of
setting right the parity issue between NID and the IITs and IIMs so
that design will get its rightful position in the educational space as
well as in the National economy in the years ahead. The NID faculty
have waited patiently for all these years for due recognition and I
hope that this wait is not in vain.

~

Dear friends of NID

I am quoting below the message that I sent today to the Secretary
Industries. I hope that the NID Alumni and other wellwishers will join
me in congratulating the BusinessWorld-NID Design Excellence Award
winners who have created a platform from which we can launch a campaign
to make design a core activity in India alongside the well established
areas on science, technology, management and to this I add fashion as
well.

The paper that I wrote as an analysis of the award too has been
forwarded to the Secretary Industries and this is being posted on this
forum as well for your review. I hope that this helps and leads to a
repositioning of design, design educators and designers in India in the
months and weeks ahead which is long overdue.

With warm regards

M P Ranjan
from my office at NID
21 July 2003 at 9.00 pm IST

To
Shri Rajeeva Ratna Shah,
The Secretary (IPP)
Ministry of Industries and Commerce,
Government of India,
Udyog Bhavan,
New Delhi

Email: indsecy@...

Subject: National Institute of Design, Its status in India and that of
its Faculty.

Dear Sir,

Let me introduce myself and welcome your proposed visit to the NID,
Ahmedabad on the 24th and 25th of July 2003. I do hope that this will
open up a new chapter for Design in India that is in keeping with the
real needs of the country and the critical roles that this discipline
has to play in the years ahead. I am a senior faculty at NID who joined
the Institute's faculty in 1976 and I have been teaching at the
Institute since then. I originally joined NID as a student in 1969 and
was then on the faculty from 1972 to 1974. I have held several
positions at NID over the past thirty odd years of excitement and great
self-fulfilment and have conducted research and educational programmes
in a number of design disciplines that are taught at NID. In recent
years I have been involved in my continued research on bamboo
utilisation and I am currently Head, The NID Centre for Bamboo
Initiatives which was set up early this year. We believe that in the
years ahead bamboo will help spawn a major sustainable industry and be
a great source of employment generation in the rural areas of India.

You may have been briefed by your department on the various matters
pertaining to NID, however I wish to bring up one issue that I believe
has been kept outstanding without decision for far too long and I urge
you to look into this matter in all seriousness at a early date. The
long outstanding issue is the matter of parity between the NID faculty
and that of the IITs and IIMs. This matter has been taken up from time
to time by the Executive Directors and the Chairmen of the Institute's
Governing Council over the past twenty odd years and there is no
resolution in sight as yet. This is of grave concern for some of us who
have helped build the Institute through its formative years and we also
hold the belief that Design is as important for India as are the fields
of Science, Technology and Management. The faculty at India's premier
design institute needs to be placed at an appropriate level in relation
to the other Institutes of national importance if Design as a
discipline is to be taken seriously in a climate of international
competition and rapid global change.

I have detailed out my arguments for this issue in a paper titled
"Design in the Real World: The time has come to reposition NID" which
is an analysis of the recently concluded first ever BusinessWorld-NID
Design Excellence Award that is the closest thing to a National
competition on Design Excellence in corporate India. The performance of
the NID trained designers who literally swept most of the awards is
perhaps the first time that we have objective data on the excellence of
the NIDs undergraduate education and I wish to use this as a platform
from which to base my plea for a reconsideration of the issue of parity
of the NID faculty with those of the IITs and the IIMs in India since
all other attempts seem to have failed in the past. The attached paper
looks at the awards and the outcomes of the various categories but the
central issue is the positioning of Design at the appropriate level and
this is in the hands of the Ministry of Industries and we will be very
happy to assist individually and collectively you in any task that may
need to be done to achieve this end.

I hope that you have a fruitful visit to NID and also find time to
reflect on the issue at hand so that we can bring it to a logical
conclusion.

The NID faculty deserve your special attention having been patient in
anticipation for over twenty years now on this long pending issue.

With warm regards

Prof. M P Ranjan
Faculty of Design
and
Head, NID Centre for Bamboo Initiatives
National Institute of Design
Paldi, Ahmedabad 380 007

21 July 2003 at 4.00 pm IST

Get up be counted, Have you casted your Vote?

Visit POLL section of the this yahoo egroup regularily and put in your opinion,
It is surprising ho many of us think of design profession and what it really
is...

You are welcome to debate those issues, but your vote can tilt the poll...

So be there...sign of leadership is that they are always there.....

lets remove some myths from our profession...POLL...and often.

regards
PS: you need a yahoo id for polling. In case you do not want yahoo id...just
mail in your opinion.

Hi,

Do share your hilarious moments from NID or from professional life with
everyone...there is a prize to be won for the best hilarious moment....Just mark
the message as "My Joke" in the subject line.

You can send as many moments as you wish..(as long as it is not just a resend)
all will be considered as sparate entries. end your mail with your name now/
earlier name and year you were at NID/ faculty. and place where you are now.
Please put/ update yr address and nos. in the database section...so the prize
can reach you fast.

There

Post your vote in POLLs and other messages if something moves u as a
designer....
This is not only a way of keeping in touch...it is also a way of letting others
to be in touch with you. If we are in touch...we can disscuss...and we can do
something together.

Post yr views on something u have seen...it need not be an amazing work of
design..just simple comments are welcome too.

but write...

regards

sudhir sharma
1983-89 GD
Pune

(Gleefully) - NID also should have had a course in English
grammar, as is made evident by this email from the Virus.
I have unleashed my editorial tendencies upon it
[comments contained within square brackets]. Possibly even
with the intent of being sarcastic, who knows ?

> Hi
> Ilove you.
[careless, careless - word separation error]
> NID requires a course in english spellings.
["spelling" is a collective noun, I believe]
> You will merit ["the" is missing] 1st choice.
> Iam saying this not in sarcasm, but in a +ve sense.
[Careless, careless - word separation error, and the "+ve"
scans clumsily]
> Small fine tuning to your english, & you become 'BIG
> PLAYER'
[Eeeagh. That should be: "Some small fine tuning of your English,
and you can become a big player."]
> Luv
> virus

Sorry, Vijay, I couldn't help that. I feel that Anglophile snobbery
of the sort you posted lays itself wide open to ridicule.....

Hee hee.

-Jayant S-

Hi
Ilove you.
NID requires a course in english spellings. You will
merit 1st choice.
Iam saying this not in sarcasm, but in a +ve sense.
Small fine tuning to your english, & you become 'BIG
PLAYER'
Luv
virus
--- srinivasarao pattur <sripattur@...> wrote:
> Way back in 1982 I designed a road side Biriyani
> Joint's sign bord as per astrological specs'!!
> In recent times One of my client evaluated the
> visiting card and letter head design as per vastu
> rules!! Well, it is funny but if you see the design
> fitted into their satisfaction and if it works then
> you are treated as god sent designer!
> This is Mystical INDIA!
> Anything do happen hear!
> NID must add on an additional inputs in the vastu or
> the mystical side of design!
> Where are you Vydi!! you fit the bill perfect! only
> thing is you need siva sitting around!
> hey guys do not take it serious, I am kidding!
> Vasu
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Free online calendar with sync to Outlook(TM).


__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com

ISHA GOEL

(Design Executive)

NID-ITPO SHOWCASE DESIGN

Hall No.19, BIC,First floor,

Pragati Maidan, ND

Tel: 011 23379645/46

Dear Friends,

I was wanting to write this mail a long back, after
reading one of the mails on the subject innovation in
the egroup. Sorry for writing late.

For those of you who do not know me, I am Sushant
Jena. I work with Whirlpool of India, stationed at
Pune.

Comming to the subject. Innovation has become a buzz
word in the industry today where every one is talking
about innovation in all possible areas. They are
exploring radical new ways to innovate and outinnovate
the competitors. Infact over last two three weeks
there has been two big articles published in Economic
times as an abastract from interview of Gary Hamel.

But here the innovation that is being talked about is
not as stereotyped as would possibly be thought. Here
the whole effort is towards making innovation a core
competence and to make it into a process so that. The
core strength of any process is that if the variable -
Human being- changes, still the output does not effect
so much and the knowledge remains.

May be I can write more some time over the subject and
practices. As a matter of fact, Whirlpool Corporation
has embraced innovation three years back and in India
we are on the way to institutionalise it. I have been
trained in it over years and now I am a mentor to
cascade that learning into the organisation.

reg

Sushant

N.B: we are looking for industrial designers with
mechanical engineering backround having one to two
years experience

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
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Hi folks,

Here is a posting from Knowledge Platform for graphic
designers. Please send your resumes to
miyer@...

Cheers,
Ripul

-----------------------------------------------------
Knowledge Platform is a Singapore-based e-learning
company. Our principal focus is on delivering
e-learning solutions for the corporate and banking
sectors, with a special emphasis on finance,
regulatory compliance and business process
management. Our e-learning solutions are divided into
Courses and Content Development.

We started operations in 2000 and delivered our first
e-learning solutions in January 2001. We have a team
of 25 people with multi-disciplinary skills in
instructional design, training management, course
development, process management, visual thinking,
graphics and multimedia, web-based learning
technologies and standards and software development.

We are setting up an offshore development facility in
New Delhi and are looking for people with an interest
and inclination in joining a growing organization.

Currently we are looking for people in the Graphics
design role. The requirements are as follows:

Graphics Design Lead role
   a.. Skills for illustration
   b.. Extensive hands-on experience (5 to 6 years) in
developing web based
media using multiple development technologies,
including Flash, Photoshop,
audio software, etc.
   c.. Hands-on experience in designing complete visual
aspect of an elearning
solution such as interface design, page layouts,
visuals, 2d or 3d animations
   d.. Basic understanding of web based content
development environments such as
Javascript, HTML
   e.. Experience with customer handling and proven
ability to translate
requirements into solutions
   f.. Experience in managing small teams
   g.. Creative, Structured, Team player, Results
focused
   h.. Communicates well in English

Graphics Developers
   a.. Skills for character illustration and building
simple animations (We are
not looking for 3d skills, only 2d)
   b.. Minimum 1 year experience in developing web
based media using multiple
development technologies for web based content,
including Flash, Photoshop, and
audio software, preferably in different types of
visual styles
   c.. Hands-on experience in visual development
   d.. Proven visualization skills highly desirable
   e.. Creative, Independent, Structured, Team player,
Results focused
   f.. Communicates well in English

Those interested can write to
miyer@...