B V Doshi

FA
Faculty of Architecture
C E P T University
BOOKLET SERIES
CAMPUS HISTORY
THESIS
CROSS SECTIONS
Contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
The Beginning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
In Conversation with B.V. Doshi
2
Virtual Campus
4
Visitors

8

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Published at CEPT University, Ahmedabad in 2012.
Faculty of Architecure
CEPT University,
Kasturbhai Lalbhai Campus, University Road
Ahmedabad-380009, Gujarat, India
Phone - 0091-79-26302470 / 26302740
Fax - 0091-79-26302075
www.cept.ac.in
www.sa-nity.net
[email protected]
Campus Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Theatre
10
Sports
16
Clubs
18
Clay, Paper, Printing
22
Classical Music
26
School Bands
28
Navratri
30
Festivals
32
Social Life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Student Council
36
Food
38
Social Dynamics
40
Wall Magazine
44
Wall Posters
46
Student Interactions
50
Miscellaneous
52
Mind Well
54
Installations
55
Construction
56
Introduction
The idea of a campus in an educational environment is central to the philosophy and orientation
of an academic institution. The campus in the form of buildings, activities, people, sub-cultures
and festivals together form the overall experience of the place. The students spend substantial
part of their lives in CEPT campus, and their stay here becomes one that transforms and moulds
their personalities. The campus culture and its places has had a tremendous impact on students
during their time here and often memories of the life in campus remain most vivid and gets
regularly recalled during conversation with old classmates and hostel friends. CEPT campus
has a very special place in the lives of the students of School of Architecture. For many years
the campus became their home away from home, and for many fortunate ones like the faculty
members, it is their anchor in this large city. It is not surprising that the foundational moments
of the School of Architecture laid lot of emphasis on the idea of an open learning environment
that is not bound by four walls of the classrooms but extends in the nature, whereby the campus
also becomes the cross roads and an open meeting points of ideas, people and visitors; a place
with no boundary and one which breaks down the barrier between students and teachers and
visitors.
The unique nature of the campus has fostered an institutional culture, which is somewhat
reflected in this booklet. It is not surprising that issues related to campus are hotly debated in
the student and faculty community. From garbage disposal to cutting of trees to food catering on
campus to dogs on campus, everything is discussed for hours, fought over and often with very
little action visible! The nostalgia associated with the campus life is a very important part of the
association of students, faculty and alumni with the Faculty of Architecture. This booklet is an
attempt to bring together these vignettes of information to give a feel of the campus in the past
fifty years. It covers students activities, food, festivals, music scenes, gossips and many other
myriad incidents; some of which were not known to many and others which are part of the CEPT
folklore now.
FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 1
The Beginning
The Faculty were selected on the basis that they must excel in
the profession and be willing to spend half their day in school,
despite the minimal wage.
I really believe that you should never be confined. There is

no clock, there is no calendar in School. You take your own time.
Students used to take 7-8 years. Why? Because they liked the
place, it was like home. There was a boy who used to live in a tent
on the lawns here because he wanted to live here. This School is
not time/space/money/recognition/door bound. The School is
an ashram it is a place where you learn to learn about life
by living with each other. There is no obligatory work it is all
by choice. The choices for every individual to find his place in
society should be provided by the School.
In conversation with B.V. Doshi

Seated on the grass-laden steps of the Sangath grounds, we
waited with bated breath for our Founder Director to address us.
An endearing storyteller with a glint in his eye, he has the ability
to enthral an audience and make them see the world through the
eyes of a romantic. We just had to put forth a few questions, and
the rest was magically woven out of thin air by his words.
What was the idea behind this School?
Here, the students come to discover themselves and become

self-sustained, self-generative. You come here to discover
what you really like so that you can become a positive
contributor to society.
I dont like going to school. I like to be at home. So I decided

to make a home. This home was not going to be like a nuclear
family with precise rules. It was going to be like a joint family
an extended family. The learning here was not going to be of one
kind, it was not going to be under a teacher. We are really guides.
This is a place where you learn from colleagues, from the people
at the canteen, from the conversations over a cup of chai.
The aim was to create an atmosphere where you dont see
divides and doors. Thats why we have big doors. I think the
whole idea of the school is a joke. Its a whole lot of humour. It
is like how Sangath is not an office. Sometimes we have theatre
here my daughters wedding happened here.
The School is not a jail. It is a bazaar a marketplace. And it
is magical, like in Arabian Nights. You can choose what you want.
All kinds of people are available here at any time. Earlier, there
werent even any doors to the faculty rooms. I believe in an open
meandering place. There were 30 to 40 mango trees on the site
which have been replaced by neem trees. There were guava trees.
I had imagined the students would eat the fruits for lunch. One
should feel like one is in a garden. People should climb the trees.
There was a guy, Chandra Vinod Pathak, who jumped from the
Second floor.
2 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections
How have things changed?

Earlier, 75% students were from outside. Then it became 50-50,
then 70-30 and now of course, its even less. The connection with
the outside has decreased, except in the postgraduate courses.
We have gone from having 30 students to having 1500 students.
Studios used to be open 24 hours. Students got exposure with the
world outside. We never had a fence. We never had security. This
School was a confluence of cross movement in the area.
Nowadays, students are worried about career and achievements.
They dont really come here for the joy of learning. They come
here for the degree and the money. I would blame the parents
for this as well. But this was never the idea of the School. One
must create experiences, rather than information. They last
longer. Each individual has to know his bearings what is
your measure of life?
What motivated you to start this School?
So the idea was that one should come here as a colleague, not
as a student. There were no rules, no exams. If someone needed
another six months, he got the time. He was not failed. We used
to have juries with the drawings lying on the floor. There were
no barriers. It was like a family, a community. There were no
restrictions of time either.
Back then we had no restrictions from the AICTE and Council of
Architecture because I didnt know about them!
I started this School because I wanted to challenge myself.

You challenge me in design, in capacity. This would be a place
that continuously provides challenges, opportunities and
the freedom to rediscover yourself. I wanted to learn, so I
started the School to keep abreast of knowledge, technology, art
and architecture. One has to challenge Western thought. No one
can imitate Corbusier. My first buildings were all polished there
were no sun-breakers. It is a challenge and you have to keep
discovering yourself. That was the main theme. The attitude
is to really allow things to happen. To create a search for
identity that would make us different from Londons A.A. and
Bauhaus.
Virtual Campus
The good old days
In 1962 when the school started, it was situated in H.L. Commerce
College. In 1963, when the next batch came, they shifted to L.D.
Arts College and occupied one floor. They were given two large
rooms which became the 1st and 2nd year studios, and one
room for the office and one room for the library. The library had
only one cupboard. In L.D. Arts College they mainly used to have
lectures under a tree and they also built some dodecahedron
tents to have lectures in. There, a table would be set up with tea
and snacks and soon it became an interactive place for Seniors
and Juniors.
Qamar Shaikh (63) recalls that he was passing through the L.D.
corridor one day in typically unshaven state and shabby attire,
when Prof. Mavlankar, who was taking his class on Political
Science, called to him, Hey you! Come here! Assuming that he
was corrupting his students by just roaming around aimlessly in
the corridor, he ordered Shaikh to sit and attend his lecture. At
the end of the lecture Shaikh actually felt that whatever the man
was saying made sense, so he talked to Doshi to have an Elective
on Political Science. That Elective happened, he says, and Prof.
Mavlankar also enjoyed teaching us because the students of
CEPT not only asked questions but also argued.
In 1964 they moved to Badminton Hall as the new batch could
not be accommodated in L.D. Arts. In Badminton Hall, there was
only one door which would get locked. The key would be at the
entrance in a little niche and anyone could go to collect the key.
Thus, the trend of working post midnight started. The culture and
ethos of CEPT began from Badminton Hall with relation to the
new building the idea of looking down into the other Studios,
the idea of no compartments and the availability of freedom of
all sorts. Qamar and Jayshree Shaikh were the pioneers of love
marriages, after which came Miki and Madhavi Desai, and Nimish
and Parul Patel.
Qamar Shaikh started the photography laboratory by converting

a toilet block, a little farther away from Badminton Hall, into a
dark room. He would make slides for Doshi and RJ Shah here.
He says, There were very few cameras on campus in those times
and they were very expensive. I bought an SLR for Rs. 1000.
Even Kodak films were not available in India in those days and
someone would have to get them from abroad.
It was a close-knit and cosy community at the time. The offices

of Doshi, Vakil and Bernard Kohn were points of contact in the
city. Off campus sketching trips under Piraji Sagara and trips to
the zoo under Esther David for Sculptures were a regular scene.
Sohan Nilkanth of 69 batch reminisces, Those early years, every

time a new batch came, everybody would be invited to Doshi
saabs house. He would talk to all the students, have some chai
and we would get to see his beautifully designed house. Even
during Holi, everyone would go to his house to celebrate and
share the joy.
CEPT redefined student-faculty relations, says Vivek Khadpekar

(64). Bernard Kohn would ask us to call him by name. That was
a big deal to us back then in the 60s because we had just come
from strict schools where Authority used to have the last word
in everything.
School was like a bazaar It was not like a supermarket, which

is organised, says Trilochan Chhaya (64), the Dean of Balwant
Sheth School of Architecture (NMIMS), Mumbai. It was more
of a design school and there never was a physical campus
for us. It was more of a virtual campus. T Chhaya is probably
the youngest architect to have graduated from India at the age of
19. When he appeared for the CEPT interview at the age of 13,
Doshi had excitedly taken him in much like an experiment. The
students were really the facultys project in those days. Each
student was much like Eklavya, learning on his own under the
awe of his/her Faculty.
There was a diversity of people on campus from around the
country. Now, there is a huge campus but no diversity, he says. A
campus, after all, is made by people not bricks and stone. Out
of the 19 students who graduated with me, I think I am the only
one who went on to become an Architect. Two people became

Hotel Managers, someones become a lipstick designer, and two
people even became magicians in Las Vegas. Its because we
were at CEPT that we discovered what we want to do. For
forty years, I have been teaching. In NMIMS, I try to implement
the idea of learning from variety, and this idea has been instilled
in me by my education in CEPT. Now I would say that CEPT has
lost its sense of humour. It is important to bring the laughter
back in CEPT.
When the School of Architecture was being built on the
Kasturbhai Lalbhai Campus, the students would visit it out
of interest. It was the first time that they were seeing such a
massive load bearing structure under construction. They saw
how Doshi experimented with the angle of the North Lights, the
indentations of which can still be observed in the concrete panes.
Originally, the site was untamed and had only two brick kilns
where the Basement now stands. Shaikh was part of a theatre
group in the city and one of their plays, Kraps Last Day, was
staged in the Basement. All the students, as well as BV Doshi, sat
on the steps and watched the play, and it was from this that they
took the decision to have a kota stone circle in the basement,
which was later also used to play garba on.
The first building to have come up on the site was the room
in front of the wood workshop, which is presently the Council
Room. It was originally the site office where the first drawings of
the SA building were made. The contractor could have removed
the site office after the construction of the building but instead,
they kept the office to use it later. At the time when Qamar Shaikh
was in Thesis, the school was concerned about research related
to climate issues, and so his thesis was a research which was part
of a bigger research program. He converted that room into his
private den and made a wind tunnel there to study air circulation
in buildings using models.
Recounts Shaikh, Office used to be in the Basement and the

Library was on top, in the present Second Year Studio. But after
the floods the Basement was emptied. Till then there was no
auditorium. The admin was only walls without shutters and
north lights, it used to be the film club and concert area (also
carrom and chess were played there). The foundation was used
later on and then the ground was dug out and it was converted
into the auditorium.
That time campus was very small just School of Architecture
and School of Planning, recounts Sohan Nilkanth, So you
virtually knew everybody at least by face. That made us very
close. You will know aaj second year ka submission hai, uska
jury hai, Chhaya ka third floor gir gaya. So we shared being on
the campus in a stronger way and it was easier to get things done.
It is so large now.
Visitors
Guest Lectures by esteemed professionals
In the 60s, due to Professor Doshis friendship with him, Louis
Kahn was a regular visitor to our campus and frequently
conducted lectures for students.
Buckminster Fuller conducted lectures on Geodesic as a Theory.
In fact, the geodesic dome in the city was installed to welcome
Fuller. The workshop included experimenting with materials like
steel and plywood and combining two materials.
Kartik Vora vividly recalls Buckminster Fullers visit to the campus

in the 80s. I was a huge fan of his and would devour his books
from morning to night. Surprisingly, none of the other students on
campus had heard about him, he recalls. As there was no Xerox
at the time, I would tape record my own voice reading Buckys
passages from his books and listen to the recordings over and Frei Otto
over again. I found them very inspiring. Of course, when I met
him and mustered up the courage to go say hello, my mouth just
clammed up out of nervousness!
Many other well known personalities have lectured on campus;
most notably Christopher Alexander, Moshe Safdie, Frei Otto,
Aldo Van Eyck, Bernard Kohn, Charles and Ray Eames, Juhani
Pallasma, Lucien Kroll, Shigeru Ban and Mario Botta to name
a few.
Buckminster Fuller
Louis Kahn
Theatre
From the Studio to the Stage
Mehboob Studios in Bandra (W), Mumbai was a huge complex
with high-ceilinged warehouses, complete with ropes, pulleys
and planks. The sounds of welding and hammering filled the
place with buzz. Inside Studio 3, the sets for a Shah Rukh Khan
advertisement were being made. It was an advertisement that
drew inspiration from the story of the three little pigs, the pigs
being Shah Rukh, and how the strongest house withstands the
huff and the puff because of its reinforcements.
The Naatakbazi was a fun-filled group that explored theatre as a

medium for entertainment and comic relief, as a release from the
pressures of academic life. Inadvertently, some people accused
them of performing slapstick humour and caricaturing people in
order to extract laughter from the audience. About this, she is
quick to clarify, We didnt want to take ourselves too seriously.
We wanted to make a statement on School, while indulging in fun
and song-and-dance.
At about the same time, there emerged another theatre group on
campus that, on the contrary, took itself very seriously. On 24th
December, 1999, the S.A. Theatre Group came into being. Artist
C.K. Murali was the chief guide who conceived and directed most
of the productions.
Shruti Gupte of 95 batch looked the absolute personification of

a behind-the-sets artist. She had on loose denims, a tucked-in
white shirt, and white goggles pushed back amid her wavy hair.
Having graduated from the School of Architecture, Shruti became
a production designer for films and advertisements in Mumbai.
Her portfolio includes films like Aisha and Taare Zameen Par.
Curiously, Guptes unconventional career choice was pretty much
decided by a single spontaneous moment in a GBM in 96, when
she raised her hand and suggested that a theatre group be made.
My seniors told me to go ahead and make one, she says. I was
hesitant because I was only in Second Year and thought that
theatre was something that the Seniors should take up. But they
threw the ball in my court and asked me to implement my own
idea. Before this, my only experience with theatre had been to
organize the school sets in my 12th grade in St. Annes School.
I got together 4 of my batchmates, among them were Sudipto
Ghosh and Abhijeet Lakhia, and we repeated my school play in
Hutheesingh. We borrowed furniture from the localites houses
and made prints in Kanoria.
On seeing our play, Sameer Parker of the School of Interior

Design suggested to me that we start a Theatre Group. Thats
how Natakbazi came into being. It was the first time that the
Schools of Architecture and Interior Design got together. We
used to design our own sets and write our own scripts, largely
drawing inspiration from life on CEPT itself.
The two theatre groups were not quite at loggerheads but there
was a subdued sense of rivalry and snobbery that existed between
the two because of their conflicting ideals. While Natakbazi was
accused of being frivolous, the S.A. theatre group was accused
of being exclusive and elitist. They were intellectualising
and formalising something that had started off as a means of
respite for students. It was abstract, intense and experimental,
concerned with exploring the spatial aspects of theatre and its
varied means of expression.
Natakbazi, on the other hand, provided a needed break from

the pressures of college life, and also provided a platform for
interaction between the students of the various Schools on
campus. Production design was a crucial component of the
Naatakbazi theatre, and Gupte strongly believes that interacting
with the SID students was a fruitful experience because they had
a lot to offer in terms of design.
The S.A. Theatre Group, on the other hand, was not productionoriented. They often came under fire by the student body that
accused them of fudging with funds, being communist and
working for personal agendas. Typical rehearsal areas being the
jungle, terraces and auditorium, people questioned why they did
everything behind closed doors.
Speaking out about this so-called exclusive tag that the S.A.
Theatre Group was notorious for, Siddharth Singh (96) says,
There was a certain rapport between the students of S.A. and C.K.
Murali. We must respect his comfort level for he was our guide
through those days. The cultural dynamism that inadvertently
existed on campus, and the common curricula and backgrounds
of the students of Architecture made it practical to have an
exclusive S.A. Theatre Group. We were looking at creating a
completely parallel structure that was independent of everything
else on campus.
interest. On World Theatre Day, the students performed street

plays around the city to highlight the opportunistic ways in which
people were trying to mint money out of the terrible situation
of the 2001 earthquake. Performing on C.G. Road was the worst
experience, recalls Siddharth Singh. People were entirely
indifferent. It was too commercial an area. It was a lesson for us
all, in that sense.
A parallel structure certainly did get created. It is interesting

to note the varied themes that were being explored on the
campus at the time. While students like Ranjeet Mukherjee
were writing parodies on student life and the party culture
for Natakbazi, the S.A. Theatre Group was adapting plays by
Tagore, Badal Sircar and Kumaranasan. Natakbazi sometimes
got canteen boys like Hiryabhai on stage, and once Zameer
Basrai (99) invited Naseerudin Shah to perform. A couple of the
stories they explored were a reinterpretation of the Ramayana
and an adaptation of George Orwells Animal Farm. The S.A.
Theatre Group, in the meanwhile, was portraying womanhood
and sexuality through bodily expressive theatre at the National
Conference on Human Rights, Social Movements, Globalization
and the Law at Panchgani.
From its inception in December 1999 to its last production in
February 2002, the S.A. Theatre Group presented 7 productions
and held 5 workshops/seminars, including a workshop on
Theatre & Architecture, in which Faculty Anant Raje took active
Tracing the origins of theatre on campus, Vivek Khadpekar of

64 batch recalls taking up the part of Mark Antony in a play
on Julius Caesar in the mid-60s. An English teacher at Xaviers
had intitiated Theatre on our campus. Halfway through the play,
the audience had walked off, so I never ended up even going on
stage!
While that didnt quite work out, in the 80s, a certain Padki in
ATIRA started a theatre group in CEPT and invited IIM students
to take part. Professional plays were staged with tickets et al. The
renowned Bengali playwright Batrij Sarkar was also called to
take an elective.
However, it seems theatre never quite took off on campus until
the mid-90s.
Coming back to Shruti Gupte, upon probing how her career

choice as a Production Designer has its basis in her schooling
in CEPT, she says: Making sets is to either represent life, or to
exaggerate life, or to mirror life. My years in CEPT gave me
a solid foundation in understanding construction, space and
materials. Now when I hire assistants, I insist that they have a
background in architecture because I realise the value of that
education in this field. My experience with night-outs in School
made it very easy for me to settle into the long work hours that
this profession demands. I fit right into it!
Like Shruti Gupte, Theatre was also crucial in changing the course
of Mustaqeem Khans life in 2003. Better known as Musa, while
he was in his First Year he had been forced into helping make
sets by his Senior Zameer Basrai. The Theatre Group was playing
Goldspot and I thought their activities looked fun so I asked if I
could join in, he recalls. I was an introvert and felt that Theatre
provided the means to express myself. In the process of exploring
Theatre, I discovered Films. And eight years later, he is on the
road to pursuing his passion for film-making.
Mustaqeem and Rakesh Semwal (a.k.a Roxy) were instrumental
in changing the S.A. Theatre Group into the CEPT Theatre
Group. This formally integrated both the Naatakbazi and the S.A.
Theatre Group. And thereon, begins another journey.
Theatre shares with architectural concerns of space and

movement, structure and interval, and nuances of light. But
that is not the real reason architects have a fascination for
theatre. More fundamentally it is the magic of the moments
of life of solitude and action and the poignancy of events
the fascination stories well told and enacted, of social
concerns and stories of gladness and sorrow.
- Kurula Varkey, Hon. Director, School of Architecture
Sports
On the playing fields
Sports have always been an integral part of life on campus. In
the 60s the M.G. Science grounds were used by students to play
cricket and volleyball, until the area was fenced off and we shifted into our own campus. Little has changed since then, and table
tennis and carrom continue to be a means of respite for students
during strenuous night-outs.
Students of the 70s fondly recall playing sports, We enjoyed the
Sports Day a lot. The University grounds would be rented for
one day. 79 batch won a lot. Selection was done batch-wise and
we participated in long jump, high jump, running, etc.
We had table tennis tournaments and volleyball tournaments.

Guys from NID, ATIRA, IIM and PIERRA came for the PENTAGON table tennis tournament. The whole school used to be
there from morning. The old canteen owner would get lunch
there in laaris.
Volleyball was a permanent game. Before going to bath everyone

used to play at least one game. Even in small breaks we played
one game and so the teacher would come saying Abhi kitna
game baaki hai? Sometimes they also joined us in the game.
Salil Randive (81) remembers playing cricket against the IIM
boys. At the time, the NID girls were a species glorified by many-a
lore, so to impress them, our boys had come up with a little trick.
There was an IPL-format Night Cricket taking place in Australia
at the time, recalls Randive, Their slogan was Big boys play at
night! So our boys, in order to impress the NID girls, got T-shirts
made for the inter-college cricket games with the slogan Big
boys join Architecture! That grabbed us a fair deal of attention,
Id say!
Always handy with their improvisational skills, students would

play squash on the brick walls of the SA Double Volume, and organise obstacle courses across campus when boredom struck.
We welded the Basketball poles, recounts Durganand Balsavar

(84). We didnt wear protective headgears because they were
uncomfortable so our eyes were literally stuck together for days
after! We went nearly blind.
Around twelve years back, the undergraduate students across
our campus felt that something needed to be organised to facilitate interaction with other colleges in Ahmedabad. Cricket was
chosen as the best medium to do so, and thus emerged the AMITY Cup, an inter-school cricket competition. Over the years the
list of colleges invited to participate has grown and now AMITY is
a highly anticipated event among colleges in Ahmedabad.
In 2010, another exciting event called the CEPT Football League

(CFL) was established. It was the brainchild of Saptarshi Mitra
(07) who had the idea that the IPL format of auctioning players
could be adopted at an intra-school level. It was a big success and
has received much support.
Clubs
Student Initiatives
Films, music, reading sessions and sketching trips have always
been a part of campus life and only became more formalized
towards the 90s.
There was a Jazz Club in the 80s that would meet every Friday
to discuss Jazz Music, over a collection of CDs that one of the
students had.
In the mid-90s, reading sessions were introduced formally by
Sameer Kumar (93), in the name of Tuesday Night Talks
and later, Raj Lavingia started Tuesday Night Enquiries. The
sessions would take place in Studios and impassioned debates
and discussions would take place on architecture around the
world.
Sunday Sketching Trips were also formally introduced in the
90s by Brinda Pancholi, Riyaz Tayyibji and Parth Shah of 91-92
batches. Jigna Desai of 90 batch introduced Architecture with
Architects, where architects take students to see one of their
buildings and discuss with them the design of that building, and
architecture in general. Besides these, a Trekking Club called
Footprints has been inititated over the past few years.
The Film Club has an interesting past. In the 70s it would bring
in reels from the UNICEF library in Bombay and screen movies
on Picasso, Eames and other artists at the Visual Artists Centre.
There was a large 16 mm projector but later on Anil Achar (82)
decided to invest in VCP/VCR. Television was very expensive
then and Doordarshan was the only channel. After much gungho, permission was finally granted to buy a TV.
Tanzeel Merchant (92) recalls that there was a crappy TV with
rabbit ears in the Council Room. When he was handling film
screenings, they used to rent massive projectors from Alliance
Francaise and request the Consulates to send in fims for free,
which showcased stories on Modernism in Holland, Dutch
Windmills and the like. When he became Council Member, funds
were allocated to the Film Club for the first time.
In the mid-90s, a Cafe at Ellis Bridge approached Abhijeet Lakhia
(93) for help in promoting itself. Lakhia and Shruti Gupte (95)
planned film screenings at the Cafe over the weekends, and thus
the Film Club formally came to be. Abhijeets brother Apoorva
Lakhia, now a renowned filmmaker, used to have a huge collection
of DVDs and this became the Film Clubs treasure trove.
Darshan Saraiya (95) took up the responsibility for Film Club
soon after and expanded its horizons. In collaboration with
MSU Baroda and NID, the SA Film Club became a member of the
National Film Archives (NFA) and organised a Film Festival.
Films from the 1930s-1970s, like Akira Kurosawas Rann,
Satyajit Rays Pather Panchali and Israeli films were screened.
Alongwith the S.A. theatre Group, the Film Club attended the
National Human Rights Conference at Panchgani, for which a
hundred films were shortlisted to be screened from a collection
of 800. These documentary films were later screened at CEPT in
2001 under the title Imagine the Other.
Along with Filmmaker Sanjeev Shah (of 76 batch) a 16mm fest

was organised with the School of Interior Design, and a Vision
of Life lecture series was undertaken which was inaugurated
by renowned filmmaker Kumar Shahani. He would critique and
comment on the films after screenings.
Today, with easy access to films, the SA Film Club has much
smoother functioning. It is inspiring to know to what level film
screenings have been taken up in the past and the passion is
contagious.
The Film Club during this time was actively taking charge of getting
hold of films that were difficult to acquire. A closed screening was
done for Anand Patwardhans politically controversial film Raam
ke Naam, and in July 2001 an 8-day Ritwik Ghatak Film Festival
was undertaken on a grand scale. It was the biggest film festival
that our campus has played host to till date and Saraiya had to
send feelers out to archives all over India, including the Ritwik
Memorial Trust, to gather his films. The festival was inaugurated
by Ghataks son Madan Gopal Singh and Ghataks wife. It was an
event that garnered much appreciation from film aficionados
around the city. Ironically, the event was not appreciated much
within CEPT itself as the student body felt that excess money
had been spent on such serious cinema that was not of much
interest to them. Faculty Miki Desai was temporarily asked to
oversee the Film Club funds.
It was really difficult to get hold of Ghataks films because he

was an anti-establishment man, says Darshan Saraiya. And there
had been a fall-out between Ghatak and the people. Our efforts to
gather his archives were appreciated much more outside CEPT.
We had stopped screening popular films because we wanted to
make use of our resources to get access to films that ordinarily
are out of our reach. This was the direction that our film festivals
took.
The Film Club and S.A. Theatre Group worked in close

collaboration during this period. An experimental approach was
undertaken for the play Start at the End, in which visuals and
relevant film clips were screened during the performance and
incorporated within the script. Characters wearing costumes
would receive images on themselves and projection of visuals
was explored in terms of theatrics.
In the late 90s, reading sessions were initiated by Sameer Kumar,

(93) under the title of Tuesday Night Sessions. He says, TNS
was originally conceived as an excuse to collectively read writings
that may be highly relevant to our work and understanding of
the immediate reality around us but focused on texts and authors
who didnt fall within our curriculum. On Tuesday evenings we
would gather in the basement or thesis studio, read texts and
discuss peoples reactions and commentary. The texts were often
post modern philosophical/cultural writings by authors like
Roland Barthes, Baudrillard, etc. Rethinking Architecture was
one major source of writings. We did read from Italo Calvinos
Invisible Cities a couple of times.
One of the more popular moves was to invite other people to
chose the text and lead the readings. For example, Professor
Kurula Varkey led once such readings. He had selected an
excerpt from Dag Hammerskjolds Markings. It was a passage
that carried a lot of personal meaning for Prof. Varkey and as
he himself read it aloud, he spoke of how the words had been a
guiding light for him through the years. It was a uniquely moving
experience for most of us present. Similarly, Prof. R. N. Vakil was
invited and so were some other people.
Through the course of the several readings we did, we found
ourselves becoming less defined about what the subject matter
should entail. In other words, we were reading much more than
post modern writings on linguistics and contemporary cultural
theories. The agenda for TNS became purer: to read anything
that would provoke thought and widen our perspectives as
individuals, not just as professionals.
******
Kanoria Centre for Arts was another place on campus, where
one was most likely to find architecture students (especially
late in the night). It was established in the early 80s, providing
a space for artists to paint, sculpt and print. There was a close
rapport amongst the students and the artists, remembers Walter
DSouza, who used to be in charge of Kanoria till mid 90s. Many
of them used to come here to interact with the artists, as well as
take their own prints. He even remembers a student who took
lithography prints for his final year sheets! The studios were
open to the students 24 hours, so many of them came here at
night for a break. The whole arrangement was open, casual and
a low-key affair.
In the 80s, there were only SA, SP and a young SBST. It was a
small campus, we all knew everyone. Atleast by face. Now it is
a big. Level of interaction is very different now. Today, Kanoria
closes at 8 pm.
******
During the early days of the campus, one side of the campus had
fruit trees, for those who wished for a snack. Now they have been
either cut down to make way for the new buildings adding to
the expanding campus, or replaced by the neem trees. Many a
times, guided by seniors, students have planted trees and some
plants (from mango trees to bamboo), mainly in the jungle and
the parking lot.
To add to this green and clean campus, many students of the

different schools of CEPT, joined together to form a CEPT
Clean Initiative in 2010. They tried various methods like
vermicomposting to segregating waste using differently coloured
dustbins.
As the number of students has risen in this university, so have
the number of plastic cups and Balaji wafer packets. The rise in
the lovers of chai (the life giving liquid), added more garbage in
the form of paper cups. The students got together and ordered
ceramic cups and sold them on campus, for a small sum of Rs.20,
assuring a Re.1 discount on whoever uses this cup for chai in
the canteen. Facing a loss, the canteen started using their own
ceramic cups to give chai, thus ending the issue of paper cups.
Clay Paper & Printing

Working with our hands
Clay has always been an important material for students to
explore and in the 60s pottery classes used to be conducted,
with students learning how to use the potters wheel. Esther
David would take sculpture classes and students would make a
temporary shelter to work in.
It all began with the need to have a place that could be messed
up and that nobody would mind having messed up. For almost a
year and a half, students cleaned the place. From 2006 to mid2007, the place became owned by the students. The need for
a roof was dire and due to acute shortage of funds, they used
materials on campus and tried out more than four different roofs.
It taught them how to make things, however big they may be,
without spending a single rupee.
Early initiatives at building a clay studio
In January 2007, a workshop was conducted by artisans from the

Bastar region on Dokra casting. Dokra is an ancient method of
casting metal. About 15 students and professors took part in the
workshop. The place is home to any kinds of student activity.
In December 2008, due to favourable circumstances (availability

of funds and enthusiasm), it was decided to build an elaborate
roof. Bamboo was acquired from CEE as the institute wanted to
control the overgrowth. Students cut the bamboo and transported
it to campus themselves. There was no pre-conceived design or
a drawing. It was built entirely on an intrinsic understanding of
the place.
With little idea about the size or expanse of the roof, the students
simply began digging the foundations and lining out. It took 20
people 18 days to erect the place from conception to inauguration.
The roof eventually cost Rs. 11,285/-.Today the roof shelters
student activities of various kinds from terracotta work, reading,
casting, brainstorming, papermaking, cooking, etc.
In December 2009, the students of First Year paved the clay hut,
under their Building Construction program. The basic material
used was brick. The program also included building a space
for storage and display which was a platform with kota stone
shelves. The two major openings spanned by concrete beams
were replaced by more permanent, reliable and aesthetically
suitable arches.
There was also a water channel constructed which not only
ensures permanent availability of water in the workspace but
also regulates and channelizes water from the nearby tanks.
Stone, lime, china mosaic and terracotta tiles were also used. All
the work, from ramming, pounding, levelling, stacking bricks,
and mixing sand and mortar for cement, were done by students
under the guidance of a mason. It was a learning experience and
made the students aware of the process of construction and most
importantly how to work in a team.
The clay studio at present
In January 2008, a 7-day workshop was conducted by Valsan

Koorma Kolleri dealing with various aspects of working with
terracotta. Techniques such as pinching, making slabs and slurry
casting were taught. Students built a kiln as well. During this
workshop the place was called Clay Club. It is the very quality
of the place that enables it to be referred to by the activity
that takes place there, eg ArchiLab, CEPT Paper Studio, Clay
Workshop.
In January 2010, Anupam Chakraborty, a papermaker from
Kolkata conducted a week long workshop. Students learnt the
basics of making paper and were later introduced to techniques
as stencilling, water marks and layering. Paper of various
materials, such as banana trunks and cotton rags, were made.
Students have enthusiastically carried forward their work and
continue to make good paper.
Papermaking
Work in progress at the clay kiln
The beginnings of the paper revolution
One of the many night sessions at the paper workshop
Clay workshop; one of its many faces through its various phases
A bamboo shelter erected over the workshop
A kiln built beside the North lawns to bake clay models
A clay model waiting to be baked
Experiments and explorations
Paper bags desegned by students
Paper mache models
Classical Music
Last year a musician was set to come and perform in Ahmadabad,

but the venue had some last minute issues. I received a call
to organize it in the School of Architecture so I talked to the
Students Council and it was done. The fact that this thing is still
alive amongst the students and that the reputation is still there
is gratifying.
Appreciation of Indian Performing Arts and

Music
I recall a particular episode where a lady musician was supposed

to perform. One early morning, she arrived by car to the campus
and checked her purse for Nivea cream as it was cold. She couldnt
find it and she refused to get out of the car until she had her Nivea
cream! It was 7:30 in the morning, many were from hostels and
I couldnt go home and get it and it would not look nice if we
give her a used container! There was so much confusion, people
running helter-skelter for Nivea!
In the intitial years, Professor Doshi was crucial in bringing

Indian classical music to the campus, in the influential avatars
of Mallikarjun Mansoor and Bhimen Joshi. Many classical music
concerts were held every winter.
Amita Raje (63) and Vivek Khadpekar (64) took up responsibility

of organising classical music concerts during that time. For Rs.
7 per ticket, an audience of 400 people would be regaled in the
Basement by musicians seated on a stage made up of 3 hostel
cots, on an earning of Rs. 2000. The first musical concert was
by renowned vocalist Kishore Amonkar. This was followed by
Kumar Gandharva and Mallikarjun Mansoor, to name a few. Sohan
Nilkanth and Neelkanth Chhaya (69) became active organisers
of classical music as well.
Recalls Sohan Nilkanth, The musicians were all approached by

us students with the request that this is an activity we are trying
to do for students, it is not a big time music show, we have no
funds or sponsors, we are trying to develop good listeners here
and many are interested in this activity. Of course we would first
go bother Doshi saab saying we want to do this in school so you
have to talk to so and so people and give us contacts.
Soon people came to know about it. So we meticulously
maintained a diary for every program and requested everybody
to write and update their addresses for the next program so
that they could be sent postcards for the next performances.
Sometimes the artists would stay with students families, so we
were able to see their daily lifestyles, how they work, prepare and
practice their ragas. We got to know these artists at a personal
level.
It had a good reputation because people knew that we called

only certain kind of artists and the programs had no commercial
element involved because it was not like a show. If you have a
musician performing in front of large audiences, say about 5000
people, then certain fine and subtle things were not possible to do.
For us it was a smaller group and the ones who sit in front make
eye contact, and there is a different level of interaction so the
artist is able to perform better and the audience can appreciate
better. Unlike a pop show where you do anything to make the
crowd cheer, listening to Classical music is a cultivated taste, so
when there are people who know it, it makes a difference. Its not
a painting where you come in the end and say if it is good or bad.
Here the audience will also make farmaish were the audience
will request, why dont you sing this raga. This is explained well
by my guruji Rajiv Taranath, who I learn the sarod from. He says
that in the other forms of music, the artist decides what he wants
to play or sing. In the western classical music, audience can say
if the piece is good or bad, not right or wrong. In raga, there are
rules to be followed and this knowledge and authority is shared
by the audience also. If something is not being followed, the
audience can get up and say that it cannot be done in this rag, etc.
That is why interaction with the audience is very important and
it is an intimate event.
I think all creative processes in some way are related to each

other and if you are involved in one, you can appreciate the
other better and it gives you a different insight and broadens
your vision. Our school has always been encouraging in having
a wide range of electives and the principle remains that you have
exposure to various other things. It was enjoyable and the artists
also appreciated it very much.
We were staying in a bungalow with a big terrace. So we started

an informal Listening Club including students, faculty as well as
others. So on Saturday nights, the sound system would be shifted
on to the terrace, people would come with their own records and
cassettes and it was just a listening session. So when there was
no live music, this was what we did.
Shuba Mudgal and Anish Pradhan at concert in the SA basement
Gundecha brothers rendering a Dhrupad composition
School Bands
Rock History on campus
Rock music has always been a favourite genre among SA students.
In the 70s, there would be jam sessions every semester with the
local bands. In one of the Studios, students would create a small
platform from hostel beds and shift the tables on the side for
people to sit.
Our first school band was started by Prashant Pradhan and
Reginald Govias (89), two batchmates who were interested in
music. It later came to be known as the Grassroots Revival and
started off with their first show at H.L. Commerce College, when
their band name was still ARCHI. Led Zepellin and Pink Floyd
were favourites among the band mates and they even made
Gujarati versions of some songs, but not finding much acceptance
amongst the general crowd, they soon shifted to playing Santana.
Prashant Pradhan fondly remembers the bands first big show
in CEPT. Ajit Menon, the co-ordinator, had mixed elevating
concoctions in everybodys drinks and torrential rain had poured
down during the show. Rain, music, and b....zemused Prashant
Pradhan, It was just perfect.
Another band had emerged in the city at the time called

Hammersmith. It was formed by an IIM student Sharad Tyagi
and his friends. The Grassroots members shared a rapport with
the band and invited them to campus for jam sessions. In 1984,
CEPT invited them to perform and sponsored them.
I was in First Year at the time, says Durganand Balsavar. We

were asked to make a poster. Well, having very little graphic
sense at the time, we made a really really sad poster and put it up
all over the city. Funnily enough, it was the maximum crowd that
ever turned up for that performance! It was Hammersmiths big
break and very soon after, they went on to become famous.
At the IIT Powai - Mood Indigo 92, Grassroots Revival was judged
the 2nd best band, beating Agni. They played professionally for
a while, charging Rs. 18,000 for every performance, and would
lavish all their money earned on after-show dinners. They even
went on to record an album, for which they changed the band
name to Grass.
Simon and Garfunkel, Pink Floyd they were all Architects,
says Durganand Balsavar. We used to take great pride in being
musicians.
The band room on campus is a daily haunt for music-lovers today.
Bands such as Tunnel Groove and Rough Tracing have continued,
over the years, to keep the spirit of music alive.
The CEPT band constantly reinvents itself across the decades while exploring new directions and dancing to an everchanging pulse
Navratri
Navratri today has exploded into a nine-day event replete with

passes and allotted days for alumni, guests and students of NID,
The beginnings of garba, dance, folk music

and much more!
Navratri celebration is the star event in our calendar today, but
few are aware of the humble beginnings of garba on our campus.
In the 60s, garba was still considered too colloquial and the rage
at the time was rock music, with rockstar students like Shafi
Hakim (62) being emulators of Frank Sinatra and other such
Western idols.
Interestingly, the kota stone circle in the SA Double Volume had

been conceived in the design of the building as a garba space.
But at the time, garba was something that the localites associated
primarily with their community and not with the campus.
The first garba on campus took place in 1979 in the basement.
Then it went to the ramp. Students Darshini Mahadevia used to
sing with Sujata while Saroj used to play the tabla.
It was in the early 80s that the garba scene began to properly
emerge on campus. Musicians were brought in from Gulbai
Tekra and a handful of students would sway to the beats around
the central tree in the grounds on the eighth day. It was by the
mid-80s that the enthusiasm to bring garba to the campus on
a larger scale emerged. Renowned sculptor Prithpal Singh Ladi
along with the Baroda School artists of Kanoria got together
and sparked the initiative. Viren Brahmbhatt (81) and Setu
Shah were familiar with traditional singers and brought them to
the campus. Navratri started off humbly with 80 people on the
grounds learning steps from each other, for the sheer joy of it.
IIM, MICA and NIFT. Posters,

lighting and installations now
form a crucial component of our
creative explorations and student
interactions.
When I was in Second Year, recalls Durganand Balsavar (84),

we went to Bhil and Dahodh to bring traditional musicians
to our campus and to learn firsthand what Navratri meant to
them. We lived with the villagers, bought their bright yellow and
orange cloths and got traditional clothes stitched by them. It was
nice because we got to interact with remote villages. The troops
would create their village temple on our grounds and conduct
the pujas. Entry was free and NID students often came. I used to
play the drum from 9pm to 3am for nine days in a row!
Longing and lighting for festivities ever welcome on campus
Festivals
Of Culture, Celebration and the Arts
The idea of Festivals to bring music, dance and culture to the
campus, began in the 80s with the Ravi Vari Festival. For
this, craftsmen from all over Gujarat were invited to campus to
showcase their local crafts and goods, as knowledge about local
handicrafts was not easily available at the time. Folk dancers
would enthral students all day. While the men would play the
drums, their wives would sing and dance while painting scenes
from the Ramayana over a long cloth.
Students were open to trying out new things for festivals and
would take it as an excuse to explore their creativity and learn
from each other. There was a time when fashion shows were
also held based on themes like Historical, Contemporary, Greek
etc. Bamboo structures, geodesic domes and tensile structures
would be built.
In the 70s, the Festival budgets used to be hardly anything Rs.
3000-5000. Electives were distributed throughout the semester.
There would be pottery, photography, music, drama, sculpture
and dance. For that, Mrinalini Sarabhai used to come here and
teach. They used to relate dance and architecture.
February 1996 witnessed the largest scale Festival that this

campus has ever played host to, by the name of MUESLI. Many
jazz, classical music and rock bands were roped in to perform,
such as Indian Ocean. There was a lot of sponsorship by builders
which enabled us to organise the Festival on a grand scale.
This extensively commercial approach, however, drew much
controversy and opposition from the student body as they
believed it went against the philosophy of our School.
On 26th January, 2001, the Drupad Utsav had been organised
that was to have artists from all over India perform on campus,
but all was cancelled once the earthquake struck. The organising
body contemplated whether to go ahead with the Festival but on
their way to pick up the artists, they saw the destruction the
quake had caused elsewhere in the city, and decided to cancel the
Festival. They decided instead to devote their efforts in helping
those affected by the disaster.
The CEPT Festival is now known as ROOTS, and apparently

derives its name from our 80s school band Grassroots Revival.
It was organised as a festive week in January when electives
and cultural programs would be organised, as a break from
the academic course. Its aim is to offer scope for exploration of
other creative and technical fields, as well as to enable a cultural
exchange.
The wall poster tradition is inseparable from the ethos of the Festival at CEPT.
Workshops are always waiting right round the corner to shake hands with festivals and other celebrations
Congregations and celebrations
Students council
Guarding values and steering aspirations of
the General body
The Council structure has always existed in some form or the
other, with experiments taking place over the course of time. It
came into existence with the Second batch (of 63) and the first
President was Kirti Shah. The name then was Students Union
and it was Dr. Vakil who suggested that the name be changed
instead to Council, as it was less confrontational a term. Initially
there were no elections, there was only selection to the Council.
The rule book states that the post of President can only be held
by one who is in Pre-Final year or above. Interestingly, in 85,
Durganand Balsavar became President while still in his Second
Year. It was a sort of de-facto election because no one was
standing for the post, and I was enthusiastic about it, he recalls,
The Seniors decided to try it out as an experiment and were
co-operative in most cases. Of course, sometimes they accused
me of being too big for my boots and took my case, but it was
a great experience. I became President again in my Fourth Year,
and we brought a ragging ban. There wasnt much of a leadership
structure at the time. Activities were mostly driven by a collective
fervour.
Council used to be the Facultys opposing body, recounts Hansal

Dabhi (96), Now one is interchangeable with the other and the
student body has lost its power.
In 2001, the Council was disbanded and an experimental approach

was undertaken whereby there were two representatives from
each batch. Obviously the attempt wasnt too successful for the
previous structure was re-adopted soon after.
In August 2007, as part of the disciplinary action that followed
ragging reports, the Students Council was disbanded and
members were debarred from holding any office that year, or
receiving any prizes. This is probably one of the few instances
where the Council severely had to bear the brunt of the actions
of the student body.
There have been many instances where renewed structures
for the Council have been suggested but the fall back structure
has stood the test of time. The present Council comprises of a
President (Pre-Final onwards), an Administrative Secretary (PreFinal onwards), an Academic Secretary (Pre-Final onwards),
a Cultural Secretary (Third Year onwards), a Sports Secretary
(Second Year onwards) and an Election Commissioner (from
Thesis year).
FRAGMENTS FROM THE

FIRST CONSTITUTION
OF
THE
SA
STUDENTS
COUNCIL
Food
In pursuit of gastronomical bliss
The Canteen was previously located at what is now the Siddhi
Photocopiers block and was called KODAR canteen, run by a
Kishore, who used to work as a peon at Doshis office, and Devaji.
When the school just started off, non vegetarian food used to
be served every Sunday morning on campus. This angered the
vegetarians who felt that special treatment was being meted out
to the non vegetarians. After much quarrelling, they settled upon
the decision that the vegetarians alone would be served sweets
on Sundays!
The alumni of the 60s fondly remember a particular andawala.

Sohan Nilkanth(69) recalls, There was a bun-wallah outside the
campus who used to serve boiled eggs. Eggs were not allowed
in campus, but he would come at night on a bicycle, ring a bell
and we would all go there to have a snack. Then there was the
canteen. Harishbhai and all who were running the canteen were
really a part of us. He would send his boy around 12 in the night
to announce that the last batch of tea is s being made. Till that
time everyone would be hanging around chatting, not really
doing much work, but then after that cup of chai, everyone would
get down to work.
There was a 62 hefty Senior who could eat a lot! Once we went
to Paramount dressed like typical architecture students, without
bothering much and the waiter was trying to show us that we
were in a posh place and should hold the cutlery in a particular
way, etc. So this guy asked for soup, ordered a pulav and asked
the waiter to put it in the soup to teach him a lesson!
Almost everybody used to live in the Hostel, recounts Parth
Shah (91),There was no PG scenario. Everybody used to eat at
the mess. Manbar Singh Negi was our mess manager and he used
to make awful food but we had to eat because we had no other
option. Incidentally, this Manbar Singh Negi was the personal
cook of a student Navnit Singh of the 60s, who brought him to
the mess because he didnt like the food being served there!
In the 70s, the canteen used to stock more cigarettes than the
paan ka gallas in the city! It was a convenient way of getting
sponsorship money for the Festivals.
Heeriyabhai, who has been working at the canteen for 37 years,

recounts, The price of a fixed lunch/dinner was Rs. 1.50. Salary
was 50 paisa per day so monthly it was Rs. 15. Now my salary is
Rs. 5000 per month. The same snack was served all day, there was
no variety in snacks. In these days, it is difficult for me to identify
which are the CEPT students on campus. In the old building there
was no water tank but now we have all the facilities to keep our
equipment. It makes our job much easier.
The head of the canteen is K.K. Shetty from Madras. In our staff, 4
are from Rajasthan, 1 from Madhya Pradesh, 5 from Madras and
Im a Gujarati chhoro. Rent of the canteen building is Rs. 20,000
per month, and the quality of food is better than it was earlier.
Besides the canteen, there have always been popular hang-out

joints around the city, especially during night-outs. Qamar Shaikh
(63) fondly recalls Mamas Canteen near the Liberty restaurant
at Commerce College Road. Whenever there were night-outs, we
would ask Mama to keep the canteen open all night. He would
keep a guy there so whenever we wanted to drink tea we would
wake up that guy and have tea and some pappadi. Mama even
helped a student pay his fees. If a policeman would catch someone
riding doubles on a bicycle, Mama would give the policeman a
cup of chai and ask him to let the kid go. Mama still remains in
our memories.
Hiren Patel (83) remembers another night-out story, We had

two people Gurjit Singh and Ajit Menon who would come at
12am.They would announce that they were going to TIMES and
would take down our orders. They would collect money, go and
come back. We always used to feel that yaar, Gurjit kitna achcha
hai sabke liye sab le aata hai. After completing studies when we
gathered at Gurjits place he said Hiren, tu muskabun mangvata
tha?. I said yeah. He asked tu double muskabun mangvata tha?
Double cheese double omlette? I said yes.
Wo kabhi double muskabun tha hi nahi! He explained that they

would go to TIMES and eat till their tummies were full and then
they would give the money to the person and say Le itne paise
hai aur itne orders, isme se jitna ho sake kar le. This way they
would complete their meals from our funds. Even the tea we
would wonder why it has cooled down and they would give the
excuse that it has cooled down because they had come from so
far. But they would actually be drinking it on the way and then
add the cooler water to it!
Social Dynamics
In defiance of authority
and an important initiative for the Film community in Ahmedabad,

but the S.A. student body itself was hardly bothered about serious
cinema like this. Such clashes between the serious and the notso-serious groups continue to be observed on campus up to this
day and should really come as no surprise.
In 1995, as the Governments ever-pervasive hold on our
Institution increased multi-fold, the interviews, which had
previously been a crucial part of the CEPT admission process,
were removed and replaced instead by the HSC marks. This
became a matter of great contention among the General Body
and it outright rejected the new batch, making the hapless lot
wear placards all day proclaiming their 12th percentages.
Uncovering the changing relations of the student body to the

institutional body over time, threw up some rather interesting
trivia.
Recounts Durganand Balsavar (86): The 80s period was in the

middle of the Hippie Culture when the world was becoming
very pragmatic. My years in school saw the passing of many
major phases. First Year was all about Modern Architecture,
then Second and Third Years saw Post Modernism, and by
the time I was in Final Year, the ideas doing the rounds were
Deconstructive.
Between 1998 to 2008, campus went through some major

changes. Night-outs were denied and the terrace was locked
up. Much of our proudly ferreted freedom was lost and a great
internal struggle ensued to rediscover what made our campus
different from any other once it had fallen prey to societys ills.
Krushnakant Parmar (98), better known as KK, recounts how

the student body had refused to move out of campus for a couple
of days when the peon came knocking at 10:30pm. When this act
of defiance was repeated, the electricity supply was cut off by the
authorities. However, they still persisted and arrived the next day
with candles, to draft under their light.
Salil Randive (81) recalls a particularly eventful strike in the

winter of 84. The student body was enraged by the fact that they
had been denied permission to stage a rock concert in the Festival
and to acquire a TV set. A particular Administrative authority
believed that such a show would be opposed to the principles of
this School. Anil Achar (82) famously drew cartoons depicting
the aforementioned as Hitler, and his comrade Shubhrajit Das
(80) joined him in making sardonic digs at the authoritative
figure. The architecture students being better at drawing and
talking than at actually enforcing a ground-breaking strike, roped
in the students of Planning, who came from places like Benares,
as they were seemingly well acquainted with the methodologies
of enforcing a strike.
Come 90s, a clash of Capitalist and Communist Movements was

observed on campus. The Socialist gang, comprising primarily
of the S.A. Theatre Group, consisted of staunch worshippers
of Laurie Baker, low-cost housing and other such ideals that
benefited society. In 2001, they came under fire by the student
body that accused them of spending a huge amount of Rs 80,000
on the Ritwik Ghatak Film Festival. Varkey had sanctioned the
money considering it an important initiative for the Film Festival
A Secret Member of the Clan agreed to meet us:

We were like the Maoists, he says. not like Anna Hazare. We
were students right. So we hated the establishment. We felt that
the Thesis programme was not going right and that the Faculty
just wanted us to finish and get out. The Thesis Room was in
the Basement at the time so it was already Underground. We
did many things that, in retrospect, were unnecessary and quite
wrong. Some of them even had international repercussions. But
hell, we were students!
On probing further:
There was this obscenely bad fish sculpture on the South Lawns.
To start with, we removed that. One day, we were playing cricket
in the Basement when some woman from Landscape got hit on
the head by the ball and suffered allegedly excruciating pain for
15 minutes. She created a hue and a cry and said that cricket
should be banned on campus. The next day, we covered every
possible nook and cranny of the Canteen with tiny prints saying
Teacher, teacher, tennis ball.
Over the course of conversations, we came to learn of an

Underground Movement in Architecture (UMA) that emerged
on the Campus in the early 2000s, much like the Illuminati and
other such secret organisations. It was a society that originated
during a particularly impassioned session of inebriation in
the Sacred Thesis Room of Lore, where everything from the
Faculty to the Course to the Administration became a cause for
irremediable ire and the realisation that something had to be
done about it fired collective imagination. Oaths were taken,
Logos made and Initiation Ceremonies conducted (which are
apparently too embarrassing to be recorded). And the aim was
simple: to create havoc.
There were other issues that irked us too, like the encroachment
by the Planners on our territory and the general inactive attitude
of the Juniors. We thought, Oh boring students, lets give them a
little scare.
We were also opposed to sponsorship for instance, there was a

Hutch stall set up during Navratri. Kurula Varkey had just passed
away. He was a very rare teacher. We felt that someone had to
preserve his values. Though we didnt really know what values
we were upholding.
Many people thought that we were terrorists. Some thought that
we were right. Most of the Faculty just enjoyed the show. Some
of them had been Underground Activists in their days as well!
Although the UMA died out (to our knowledge at least) once its
members passed out, the spirit of rebellion that every S.A. student
possesses never did. In 2006, a brazen and unabashed Loo
March took the campus by storm. Enraged by the lack of toilets
on campus, students marched into the Administration carrying
urinals, WCs and basins, while making loud and obnoxious fart
sounds. The point was effectively made and action was taken
almost immediately.
A supposedly anti-establishment man and one who is wellknown around campus for his wall paintings and supposed
statements, Hansal Dabhi of 96 batch is quite unaware of what
all the fuss over his antics is about. Other people make statements
out of my work. I just do what I want to do. The artist is very
different from the philosopher. One day I felt like painting a toilet
on the Canteen wall, so I painted it, went home, and slept. Next
day, I arrived on campus to find a heated argument ensuing in
front of the wall. The Administration was repulsed by the image
of a loo at a place where one eats, while others melodramatically
argued that India was full of such places where people sit next to
toilets and eat. The wall was whitewashed and next day, someone
painted Osama Bin Laden and liquor bottles all over it. People
were then offended by the shameless act of portraying liquor
bottles in a Dry State, so the word Rasna was scrolled over the
bottles to indicate absolute innocence!
Many will remember the nameless life-size wire/paper mache

puppet that used to do the rounds of campus daily. Dabhi was
the man behind this. He moved the puppet around campus for
two years it has been seen hoisting the flag, playing goalie for
tournaments, having chai at the canteen, dangling in a suicidal
manner, occupying the stage before a concert and wearing
Santas clothes. It had become quite a feature in those days and
people would look forward to seeing what new shenanigans the
nameless puppet would be up to.
Dabhi has questioned established rules in his own small ways. He

would paint walls on campus that were not meant to be touched.
I do things for myself without thinking about how people will
react. I knew that some people would hate the pink polka-dotted
wall I had painted, but I went ahead with it because only pink
paint was available at the time! Its very interesting to learn of my
own intentions later, from other people!
One thing that does irk Dabhi, however, is the change that has
come about in CEPT academics. Faculty never used to interfere
in students activities, he remembers. Each and every Faculty
was knowledgeable of his/her field, and one had the freedom to
reject a Facultys ideas. Once, a boy was failed in Studio because
he had not followed the Facultys guidance. The entire class had
called for a GBM and stood up for him, saying that he had worked
more than all of them and that if he was to be failed then all of
them must be failed too. But nowadays the student body is so
loose that Faculty can fail 9 students without even giving solid
reasons. Faculty must never mix a students personal life with
academics.
He elaborates further: Earlier, Juries would happen even if one
only had sketches and block models. I have seen Final Year Juries
take place only around a model. Are we draftsmen? No. Look
at the idea. Faculty were practical back then and knew their
priorities. Now discipline is being given more importance
than design.
Whether one chooses to start a Movement or to raise a strike, to

paint a wall or to draw a cartoon, this campus offers the freedom
to voice ones dissent in many ways and to never bow down in
servitude to Authority. The myriad social dynamics that this
place has seen serve as testimony to this.
The Wall Magazine is a notorious

bulletin board whereby students
share articles, cartoons and
opinions. It is an excuse to
hone ones creativity and is a
forum for voicing ones dissent
unabashedly.
Prior to its formal creation in the

early 90s, students would often
pin up caricatures and other
cartoons all over campus. Anil
Achars Khareesingh was the
first comic strip that took this
campus by storm. Many have,
over the years, maintained this
tradition and come up with their
own comics and write-ups.
The Wall Mag continues to
periodically die and be revived
depending on on how shameless
and vociferous every coming
batch dares to be.
Wall Posters
Piraji Sagara, while painting a wall panel for the basement
Student Interactions
About... us.
One point that we noticed through our conversations with alumni
was that CEPT students used to have much interaction with NID
and IIM students in the past. When we asked Durganand Balsavar
(84) what led to the reduced interactions with other Schools, he
muses, Well, the students of the 80 and 81 batches had many
good friends in NID and IIM. Perhaps our batch was culprit in this
loss I suppose every batch has to sustain these relationships
and we didnt really. This reminds me of an interesting rumour
doing the rounds in our time about two Secret Computers in
India, one with the Ambanis and one with NID! The topic was a
source of much excitement and envy.
Hansal Dabhi of 96 batch has a more thorough theory about

what has led to our reduced interactions with not only the
other Institutes but also within our own Institute. There was
no internet, no cell phones and only Doordarshan in those days.
Technological growth has led to increased isolation. Back
then, we couldnt Google for information. If we needed to know
something, we had to ask people and talk to people. We would go
to SID and SBST just to know what they were doing. We would
design like Zaha Hadid and Calatrava, and our SBST friends
would help us know whether our designs could even stand. We
couldnt stay in the hostel all day watching movies or sitting on
the internet. Hence everyone was on campus at all times. When
people came over on Exchange, we would talk to them to find out
how they study abroad. Now everything is so easily available to
us over the internet that no one bothers to interact one-on-one.
There used to be so much involvement in all activities that people
had to be forced to not participate. Nowadays it is the opposite.
Nevertheless, one rather questionable mode of interaction that
has existed on our campus for a long time calls forth many
nostalgia-tinted memories from the alumni and sparks much
fascination among the luckier Juniors who were spared.
Living in the hostels was an experience in itself. One grew up

quickly back in the 80s because many older people who had been
doing their theses for over a decade used to live there. Sometimes,
one was made to wear pyjamas to school. Other times one was
lucky to have even one eyebrow and half a moustache intact, and
a blanket to wear as clothing, to the morning lecture.
Students of the 90s recall how they would sometimes sleep on
bus stands for fear of going to the hostel, where they would be
met by Seniors who would allot them daunting tasks.
Shruti Gupte of 95 batch says: In my time, Seniors from 82

onwards were still on campus and they used to rag us a lot. On
my first week in School, I called up my father asking him to come
to the city because I didnt know how to handle it. He just told me
to do exactly what the Seniors tell me and enjoy it because those
people will eventually become my best friends. And its true,
these people are the ones who are my best friends till date. It was
all really an exercise in breaking ones inhibitions and forcing
one to come out of his/her shell.
Parth Shah of 91 batch concurs: I enjoyed ragging and I believe
in it. I think that it is absolutely essential, but you have to do it
with a great sense of understanding and not simply out of some
perverted enjoyment. It creates great bonding between Seniors
and Juniors. Ragging instils in you the willingness to fail. You
learn to take insults and failures positively and you work harder
to get through it.
Puneet Mehrotra of 95 batch adds: Freshers party used to be in

the Basement and every 1st year had to perform something. The
entire school used to come and watch. If they like it, its good,
and if not, then you were welcomed with eggs and tomatoes.
That used to be the time when you were formally accepted into
the student community. All Seniors used to come and formally
introduce themselves.
Following tradition, on a fun-filled evening in 2007, a Talent Show
was to be held by the First Years for the Seniors. What started off
as seemingly harmless fun, albeit at the expense of the hapless
Juniors, ended in police intervention, media bashing, disciplinary
action and the enforcement of a redefined Social Structure that
has undeniably changed the campus forever.
A certain student from another School complained to the police

that ragging was taking place in CEPT because eggs were being
thrown at the students. The media and the police hoarded in by
the dozens and to save face, strict punishment was meted out to
all 2nd-3rd Year students of SA, SID and SBST. Of course, that is
strange considering that most of the inappropriate interactions
were conducted by the batches senior to these, but no one felt it
worth mentioning at the time.
It was decided that for an entire semester, every weekend from

morning to evening, the students would do social service as
part of a Community Environment Improvement Project.
Classrooms were painted, sandpits were built, swings were made
and taps were repaired. Hriday Gami is hardly nostalgic as he
recalls those days: We used to do all this work and come back the
next day to find fan blades bent, and taps and tubelights stolen.
These were rowdy 8-year-old kids who used to smoke and chew
on masala. Our Institution Semester was jacked as we could no
longer work on weekends. When we finally put up a presentation
documenting our Social Service work for the parents of the
Juniors to appreciate, only two parents turned up from all three
schools!
Much can be argued about what is appropriate and what is

inappropriate behaviour. If our Seniors are to be believed then
perhaps we really have missed out on a life-changing rite-ofpassage. There is no doubt, however, that we are more cocooned
off these days from each other although on the surface, the world
is at our fingertips.
Miscellaneous
Non-stop shenanigans
Travelling down memory lane with alumni from the past 5
decades, we came across many stories that cannot be put into
any categories.
Our love of automobiles goes back a long way. Gurpreet Singh
of the 60s became legendary because he was the first person to
own a bike and would park it on the ramp. When motorcycles
started to become a rage, there was one Bobby which became
popular after Rishi Kapoors movie, and then there was one
Nortan and one Honda.
Qamar Shaikh recalls a Shetty who was quite a character. He used
to sleep stiff and nude like a mummy, because he thought he was
a re-incarnation of an Egyptian.
Back in the 60s, the fees for one semester used to be Rs. 450,
and a students monthly allowance from his parents would be Rs.
100.
In 81, Ahmedabad was flooded in the monsoons. Waste deep

waters flooded the hostels and the SA Basement was completely
flooded by 8-10 feet of water.
Ini Chatterjee of the 80s is one student who many remember for
his bizarre and bold design ideas and show-stopping juries. In
Pre-Final year, while all had settled for a sane legislative building,
Ini Chatterjee decided that his client would be the villain Rama
Shetty of the film Ardh Satya. And in Final Year, he came up
with an even more out-of-the-ordinary design idea, based on
John Lennons song Imagine. In his jury, the entire campus had
packed itself into the Studio. Instead of introducing his project,
Chatterjee simply played the song over speakers and refused
to elaborate further, insisting to the Jurors that his project was
simply anything they imagined it to be. Guts and conviction were
required to pull off something like this, and pull it off he did, for
he topped the semester.
Somethings dont change with time, and bunking is a habit that

students will never grow out of! Hiren Patel (83) recalls, When
C.B. Shah used to teach in our class, we would hear a noise
DHum after every Yes sir. Yes sir, DHum Yes sir, DHum.
and everyone would be jumping off from the balcony after giving
attendance! When he would look up he would see half the class
empty and he would never realize!
A colleague of Leo Pereiras remembers him having nightmares
and not being able to work in his office because one of his
students Mukesh was hell-bent on cutting all the trees in his TY
project and only using their trunks as remembrance. I cant
work. Mukesh is cutting the trees! he would murmur all day.
Much adored Faculty R.J. Shah may not be aware but his students
had built a ceremony of sorts around the Legend that he is.
Imitating a station master of a train, a slow drone of letussayletussay-letussay-letussay would start in the Final Year Studio,
magnify in volume in the Third Year Studio, and ultimately
reaching its climactic halt at First Year Studio with a loud youknoooow-HOW!
A certain student of 91 batch was nefarious for his obsessive
habits. He was known to spread imported European talcum
powder on his drawings, have a personal phone in his hostel
room (which everyone of course took plenty of advantage of
once the number got leaked), and wear a Rotring T-shirt while
everyone else was into the standard brands. According to popular
stories, his fellow classmates were once so infuriated by him, that
they built a solid brick wall outside his hostel door while he was
peacefully sleeping at night.
Legend also has it that once a student was so soundly asleep in
the Studio, that Miki Desai had an entire wall built around him.
And on an even larger scale, in the early 2000s, the Colonel

had a wall built overnight around Hutheesingh after a row
with its administrators. But the students broke it down almost
immediately. They preferred to retaliate by throwing eggs at the
rock shows being staged in Hutheesingh.
Brinda Pancholi (92) remembers the Valentines Day
celebrations on campus. At the end of the day, a Rose Queen and
Rose King were declared who would have to dance together. It
was a fantastic day with white, yellow, pink and red roses, she
says. She recalls a particular Valentines Day when all the girls
had decided to give roses to their Faculty Surya Kakani. So all day
long, one by one the girls would give him a rose. Surya Kakani
waved back at them, as they were gathered to see his reaction,
and said, Bye girls, I will show these roses to my wife!
While on the topic of love, there used to be a Prem Kunj near the
jungle that, as the name suggests, was a famous spot for all sorts
of nefarious activities in the 90s.
Installations
Mind well
A student remembers the Legendary R J Shah
Mind-well, let us say you know that we shall call this the story
no. 1!
R.J. Shah needs no introduction (for pre-2000 batches) but it

would be a crime, mind-well, to not introduce him. Yet, I am at a
loss for words that can best express him. Maybe it will suffice to
say that the day after the devastating earthquake of 26th January,
R J Shah took a class as usual at 7:45 am in the morning. Luckily,
I wasnt a student then. Maybe someone else from 1998-2001
batch might be able to tell that story better.
I am pretty certain that visions of RJ Shah serenading his slides

with his back turned towards us are etched in our memories
without a scope of deletion! The funny thing is that there is
a collective and common memory of this man, or should I call
him an institution unto himself. Many a times I have wondered
whether each one of us is repeating the same story inadvertently
constructing an urban legend, or that in a strange case of dejavu, identical incidents played out with each one of us batch after
batch.
The story, however, begins the next day when we all went to Diu.
RJ Shah wanted to talk about the fort wall and its construction
but one thing led to the other and we were at the beach late in the
afternoon. It wont come as a surprise to many of us if I told you
that RJ Shah forbade us from entering the water. On hindsight, I
think it was a lesson in creative thinking because each one of us
was coming up with excuses that necessitated entering the water,
the commonest modus operandi being throwing the frisbee in
water and diving to retreat it. Anyone who thinks that s/he can
fool RJ Shah is a fool. Some teachers have eyes at the back of
their heads; RJ Shah, I firmly suspect, could smell the thoughts
as they formed in our minds. The frisbee was confiscated in no
time and all we were left with was an opportunity to take a class
photograph on the Diu beach.
Geodesic Dome
Water an installation
And a picture is worth a thousand words. And some stories (of

what happened on the bus ride back to Ahmedabad) are best left
unsaid!
The Pond, 2004
It is in this context that I recount the incident when RJ Shah

decided that we should visit the Ambuja Cement Factory at
Kodinar in Saurashtra as part of our Building Construction course
in First Year. Kodinar being very close to Diu, a short excursion to
Diu was planned after the visit to the factory. Our seniors were
both jealous and snickering at the idea of going to Diu with RJ
Shah of all people. The visit to the cement factory went off very
well; we were privileged to get such hospitality and access to the
factory.
Bottle Arch, 2006
Construction of the Dome, 2005
Construction
Putting construction theory into practice has been a tradition we have maintained through the decades, enabling hands-on
experimentation with materials and forms.
RSP
PUBLISHED THESIS 4
PUBLISHED THESIS 3
KUDOL
PUBLISHED THESIS 2
UJJAIN
RAJPIPLA
THESIS OVERVIEW
1962- 2012
POST DISASTER
INITIATIVES
COMMUNITY
ENGAGEMENT
MUG SHOTS
ENVIRONMENT
MAN AND SOCIETY
CROSS SECTIONS
PEDAGOGY
THE CHANGING CAMPUS
This booklet was put together during the SA50 publication workshop in December 2011, involving students guided by Riyaz Tayyabji.
The final layout and formatting has been done by Sinali Ratanlal and Sivith Kumar.
CAMPUS HISTORY
PUBLISHED THESIS 1
OUTREACH
KOTHARIA
THESIS
GLIMPSES
ARTS AND CRAFTS
ARCHITECTURE
COURSE
CURRICULUM
FA
CAMPUS HISTORY, CROSS SECTIONS
The Faculty of Architecture, CEPT University is celebrating its Golden Jubilee this year. Over the
past 50 years the school has been home to a host of students and teachers, providing the setting
for germinating ideas that have borne fruit both within the campus and in the world around. The
booklet series provides an opportunity to tell this story not only to put the past in perspective
but also to chart an informed road to the future.
Any recollection of history is partial and can never do justice to the plethora of issues worth
publishing. The booklet format allows the possibility of covering diverse issues like teaching and
learning methods, ideals and ideologies, student works, institutional culture and contributions
to society. The booklet format also allows us to look into the future by adding to and commenting
on previous booklets.
SA50
This Booklet Series has been initiated
as a part of SA50, celebrating 50 years
(1962 - 2012) of School of Architecture,
CEPT.
These booklets might appear small and simple but are made possible only through hours of hard
work and inputs from a very wide range of people. The students of the Faculty of Architecture
have worked on these booklets with a spirit and enthusiasm that are the hallmark of this
institution. It was also heartening to see the alumni spending hours with these students without
which we couldnt have talked of the early years of the school. The past and present visiting and
core faculty members also deserve special mention for taking the effort to provide material for
this endeavour.
The first part of this series focuses on five themes- Pedagogy, Research, Outreach, the Related
Study Programme (RSP), and Campus History. Teaching and learning methods are addressed
under the pedagogy theme whereas the research theme focuses on the research thesis
programme in the tenth semester. The school has always been concerned about its connections
with society at large and this is highlighted in the outreach and RSP booklets. The campus
history series charts the long and colourful history of the campus and its people.
Institutions are not merely places of teaching and learning; a campus nurtures and moulds
minds to create thinking individuals. The campus becomes the home of students. It nourishes
them and is often a transformative experience. The CEPT campus, over the last five decades has
been witness to countless such mouldings. These individuals in turn have left their mark on
the institution. Booklets in this series trace this journey of the institution- its people and the
campus.
Faculty of Architecture
CEPT University
Kasturbhai Lalbhai Campus,
University Road,
Ahmedabad-380009, Gujarat, India
Phone - 0091-79-26302470 / 26302740
Fax - 0091-79-26302075
www.cept.ac.in
www.sa-nity.net

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FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 1

I really believe that you should never be confined. There is

In conversation with B.V. Doshi

What was the idea behind this School?

Here, the students come to discover themselves and become

I dont like going to school. I like to be at home. So I decided

2 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

How have things changed?

What motivated you to start this School?

I started this School because I wanted to challenge myself.

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 3

4 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

Qamar Shaikh started the photography laboratory by converting

It was a close-knit and cosy community at the time. The offices

Sohan Nilkanth of 69 batch reminisces, Those early years, every

CEPT redefined student-faculty relations, says Vivek Khadpekar

School was like a bazaar It was not like a supermarket, which

one who went on to become an Architect. Two people became

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 5

Recounts Shaikh, Office used to be in the Basement and the

6 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 7

Kartik Vora vividly recalls Buckminster Fullers visit to the campus

8 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 9

The Naatakbazi was a fun-filled group that explored theatre as a

Shruti Gupte of 95 batch looked the absolute personification of

On seeing our play, Sameer Parker of the School of Interior

10 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 11

Natakbazi, on the other hand, provided a needed break from

interest. On World Theatre Day, the students performed street

A parallel structure certainly did get created. It is interesting

12 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 13

Tracing the origins of theatre on campus, Vivek Khadpekar of

Coming back to Shruti Gupte, upon probing how her career

Theatre shares with architectural concerns of space and

14 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 15

We had table tennis tournaments and volleyball tournaments.

Volleyball was a permanent game. Before going to bath everyone

Always handy with their improvisational skills, students would

16 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

We welded the Basketball poles, recounts Durganand Balsavar

In 2010, another exciting event called the CEPT Football League

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 17

Along with Filmmaker Sanjeev Shah (of 76 batch) a 16mm fest

18 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 19

It was really difficult to get hold of Ghataks films because he

The Film Club and S.A. Theatre Group worked in close

20 . FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections

In the late 90s, reading sessions were initiated by Sameer Kumar,

To add to this green and clean campus, many students of the

FA Booklet Series . CAMPUS HISTORY . Cross Sections . 21