Indian School of Mines

Golden Jubilee 1957 Batch Reunion – A Report by Mr K Srinivasan – 2007 (Feb 4 - 5, 2007):

2013-07-08T03:01:00.000-07:00

Trip Down Memory Lane:

Let me start by placing a Historical Photo of the 1957 batch below, who can be called as pioneers of making it a History by having their REUNION after 50 YRS at the portals of our Alma mater – Indian School of Mines. 16 mates joined to meet and revive their old memories after passing out from this great institution in the year 1957. (I am told few of their mates had already left for their heavenly abode and our tribute goes for them also.) This batch of 1957 celebrated their G J in conjunction with Basant festivities held every year in the month of Feb’ 2007, on the 04^th Feb’ 2007 and 05^th Feb’ 2007.

This historical achievement, led others (juniors) in coming batches to follow. But the next one was only in the year 1960.

It has now become a regular feature of celebrating Golden Jubilee REUNIONS during Basant festivities at ISM, and after 1957 batch, it has been followed by 1960, 1961, 1962 & 1963 batches. They all in common have enjoyed this great event to meet & greet fellow mates parted 50 years ago and to have a life time thrill which no institution can probably boast of, in the whole world, if I am not wrong.

Photographs of 1957 Batch Reunion:

No: 1 - L to R: Sitting, Prof S P Banerjee, H K Roy, S K Bagchi , R K Roy, S K Chowdhary,

S P Verma , I Kumar, P C Shyam .

L to R - Standing – K Srinivasan, P Chowdary, G Padmabhan, D K Burman,

Prof. B K Mozumdar, M L Malik, S N Jha, B Dharam

No: 2 - At the Play grounds.

L to R: Sitting – S K Chowdhary, M L Malik, I Kumar, D K Burman, S K Bagchi,

R K Roy, S N Jha, H K Roy.

L to R: Standing - S P Banerjee, K Srinivasan, B K Mozumdar, P C Shyam,

G Padmanabhan, P Chowdhary, B Dharam

In the last couple of years, Golden Jubilee celebrations for 1960, 1961, 1962 and 1963 batches in my blogs have been made live, and have been read with great enthusiasm all around the world. I was requested by Prof S P Banerjee who by then had read few of my blogs for other batches, to place it on record and write for his batch also. But due to reasons beyond my control and due to my health concerns and insufficient available input - my work was retarded but my zeal to write their blog was still burning like fire. Then I wrote yet another communication to Mr K Srinivasan of the 1957 batch, to help me with a report along with chain of events and photos etc. of their G J get together so that I could do justice to the FIRST EVER G J ALUMNI MEET CELEBRATIONS – and be well recorded for future batches. It’s been long time since they had reunion and few mates who even joined the reunion have since passed away. Any way hopefully we are able to accomplish this task with the same zeal, love & affection as was written for other batches and my commitment to Prof S P Banerjee will also get fulfilled the day this blog will go live.

Today as we are recording these memories, we have unfortunately lost few more members of this batch who have left us for heavenly abode. Anyway, I can say the spirit ignited by our mates of 1957 batch, have once again revived our age old traditions of meeting & greeting.

It’s been not easy on a regular basis to meet your mates, once you are settled in your active professions in different parts of the country , more so for all those who left overseas and made their home abroad – but they can now have an once in life time thrill and joy to meet their mates during G J Celebrations. These celebrations have now been coupled with Basant festivities held at ISM every year.

Golden Jubilee blogs by this author for 1960, 1961, 1962 & 1963 batch can be read by clicking an opening new window to read:

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2012/07/golden-jubilee-1960-batch-reunion.html

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2011/03/golden-jubilee-1961-batch-reunion.html

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/golden-jubilee-1962-batch-reunion.html

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/golden-jubilee-1963-batch-reunion_21.html

All the photos which were taken by different people and writer had it have been preserved, and readers are encouraged to tag them with names and also add any comment as a tribute to this moment you enjoyed - A Thrill of your Life Time.

https://picasaweb.google.com/115933331088209325388/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb200705thFeb20071957Batch?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJDepOnR7biZIw&feat=directlink

Statistically our blogs viewed so far has crossed a figure of more than 38,000 people who have viewed and read them, and shows the keen interest of knowing our activities of our esteemed Alma Mater on a regular basis.

Let me start by adding a historical group photo of 39 students out of 46 students who passed out are in farewell photo taken in 1957, the other six persons missing from the photograph are – Mr J B L Sharma, Prof. S P Banerjee , S K Mukerjee , C S.Sharma , H K Roy, and S K Bagchi & Prof B K Mozumdar who joined with us but completed his degree a year or two later when they were all in final year, how smartly they all posed for this shot, who knew they may ever see it again or will meet with their mates after 50 years.

No: 3 - Back Row:

K Venkataraman, H R Gupta, K B Mazumdar, Inder Kumar, M K Jha, A S Prasad, V N Gupta.

2^nd Row

P C Biswas, R N Sinha, Md. Murtaza, P D Nath, P Chowdhary, K Srinivasan, G Padmanbhan, S S Jha,

C B Prasad, B Dharm.

3^rd Row:

P N Ghosh, B Sen, D K Burman, R K Roy, S R Sinha, P C Shyam, D N Rimal, S K Banerjee, M L Dugar.

Front Row:

J R Saggi, M L Malikm G Rahangadaley, S S Srivastava, R Bhadada, C Krishnamurthy, S N Jha,

G R Manandhar, S P Varma, M R Raghava, Y Singh, S K Chowdhary, R N Upadhyaya

Golden Jubilee 1957 Batch Reunion – A Report by Mr K Srinivasan – 2007 (Feb 4 -5, 2007):

No 4

Mr K Srinivasan wrote in his report: I quote:

It was way back in 2003, that it came up in our minds to have a Golden Jubilee get-to-gather. At that time after our retirement from service, five of our batch mates including me namely Baskaran Dharam, G. Padmanabhan, C. Krishnamurthy, Sathyaprakash Verma were living in Chennai. We used to have our regular get-to-gathers, but we were getting old, but still young at heart At one such meet we remembered with nostalgia, our first ever meeting at the portals of ISM campus on the 29th of June 1953, while reporting for our First year classes at ISM, which were due to start, on the morning of 1st of July 1953.

Initially we thought to commemorate our joining ISM in 1953, in the year 2003 which marked our joining ISM – 50 years ago. We contacted a few of our classmates like Sakti Banerjee, and others, but somehow the idea did not gain momentum, due to various reasons – may be the lack of common choice on a common venue or convenient venue, even when we offered to host this meet in Chennai. Similarly other venues like Delhi, Kolkata etc., were not convenient due to travel, as we were all in senior age brackets.

Due to our great zeal with a lot of memories of yesteryear's etched in our minds , in the year 2006, Padmanabhan , Dharam and myself took a firm decision that we will be celebrating the Golden Jubilee of our passing out from the School and make it concurrent with Basant celebrations of 2007. Our thoughts & efforts – paid great dividends as this was acceptable to one and all and to meet on the portals of ISM, once again in our life time. We all thought with nostalgia that it will be a great event and could also pave the way for future batches to follow.

October’ 2006 - It was a herculean task, but I took upon myself the role of the coordinator, and started the spade work. Some of the activities are listed below to achieve our objective to celebrate Golden Jubilee.

I requested Sakti Banerjee to get contact details of the organizing committee for Basant 2007 for more effective co-ordination.
Mr Alok K Mukhopadyay of the Engineering and Mining Machinery Department was the organising committee Secretary, and Mr T. Kumar, and then Director at ISM was the Chairman. Mr A K Mukhopadhyay was made co-coordinator from the School side.

This helped us to get a complete list of our batch mates from the Office of ISM, and we also got a copy of the Group Photograph of our full batch at the time of our farewell meeting in 1957. From this photograph we prepared a list of the names of all our batch mates and started a hunt for their contact details.

We made a complete directory with the help of - internet, which made our task easier.

Out of the 46 persons who passed out in April 1957, in Mining Engineering and Applied Geology, (the only courses being offered in the School at that time) we found that only 39 were surviving then, but we could not locate 3 mates, even with the best of our efforts. 20 mates had email Id’s, and rest we corresponded over phone and postal mails. This led us to have fresh directory of all our batch mates, with their complete postal addresses, phone and mobile numbers and email ids, as for as possible. We even got the addresses of the 7 spouses of our departed mates. I must acknowledge the efforts of Prof S P Banerjee, who was our prime resource person along with our other mates.

Basant 2007 – This was to be held on Sunday 04^th Feb’ 2007 and we decided that we all will spend at least 2 full days in Dhanbad, including Basant day. This, we thought, would be convenient and easy for all , and a few suggested that having come so far to Dhanbad, we could also use this opportunity to visit other nearby places and meet some of our other friends.

Once a firm decision was made for G J Get-to gather, next was to make modalities of travel as we were all in our seventies and traveling long distances was definitely not an easy job, especially for those of us who were keen to join with their spouses for the meet.

We thought it would be a good idea to be in Dhanbad latest by the night of 3rd Feb. to be able to take part in Basant on the 4th, as we wanted to spend the 5th, only with our batch mates and their spouses.

Boarding & Lodging: I was in regular touch with Mr Alok Mukhopadyay (AM) at Dhanbad, for all arrangements for our stay and hospitality, while we were there, and Alok was very helpful in getting these done. About 15 rooms in the Executive Development Center were reserved for us, and our meals were taken care of by center's canteen, all on a fully chargeable basis at actual s. This was acceptable to us, as three of our friends were living in Dhanbad itself. This was of huge assistance. Alok had even arranged for us an ISM bus for the pickups and drops for us from Dhanbad station.

December’ 2006 - With a regular stream of emails and Indian post, the interaction went on with our mates and by end December 2006 , almost 25 persons had indicated that they would be happy to be there for the meet.

The bulk of these were from areas around Kolkata, Ranchi and Dhanbad itself.
Three were from Delhi.
Our team from Chennai consisted of Mr & Mrs Padmanabhan, Mr Dharam, Mr Sridhar - along with his mother Mrs K Venkataraman, and me and my wife Malini.

We booked our train tickets a full two months in advance, and advised all our friends to do so, especially if they were taking a train journey. At this stage all the preliminaries being completed, we were ready, and started the countdown for the final day.

Saturday - 03^rd Feb’ 2007

We all arrived by 9.00 pm on the night of 3rd Feb’ 2007, sixteen of our batch mates, ten with their spouses, reached Dhanbad Railway Station and were picked by ISM bus waiting outside the station.

No: 5 – Dhanbad Railway Station

At railway station we were keen to visit Ganesh Tea Stall – where we used to take our Tea, Milk with pera (sweet burfi) – served in clay matkas. One Anna for small and two Anna’s for big matka (clay shaped bowl to serve tea) – but to our shock it was not there and the present owners had no idea of Ganesh and his stall – which made a roaring business in our times.

No: 5 a EDC Center

At the Executive Development Center:

It was great fun meeting our other friends who had already arrived, some after almost 45 - 50 years after we left School. It was a moment of sheer thrill, pleasure, and great joy, and we spent a rather late night recalling with nostalgia of yesteryears / days reminiscing about the good old glorious days, when we first stepped on the portals of ISM. We also felt the absence our departed friends with a great feeling of sadness and kept a brief silence and prayed for our friends – that we have not forgotten them from core of our hearts.

We had our dinner in the canteen, sitting like our old days in mess and had lot of chit chatting etc. It’s hard to explain the joy & mixed feelings we all had!

Later we retired to our rooms at EDC; believe me it was past mid-night.

LIST OF 16 GOLDIE’S WHO MADE HISTORY, AFTER 5 DECADES!

In the afternoon, there was a small ceremony of the opening and Inauguration of an Alumni Hall, in the eastern side of the Mining Machinery block, allotted to the ISM Alumni Association by the School.

Later there was also a General Body meeting of Alumni Association.

We took great pleasure in revisiting the hostel rooms where once we had stayed during our school days, with our mates and spouses.

In the evening , we all got to gather for the main fellowship and get-to-gather , followed by a variety entertainment programme , speeches and a special introduction of our batch, as the first batch ever, celebrating their "Golden Jubilee Alumni Meet ", to the audience of all alumni, faculty and guests, and giving away to all of us a special memento. It was on the whole, a very thoroughly delightful occasion, followed by a grand dinner. The next day, we had the whole day to us - our own batch mates and the spouses.

a) We were sitting sharing old memories, gossips, jokes and exchanging information about our families etc., followed by a small photo session. Later, a few of us set out to visit Hirapur, the older part of the town, the Purana Bazaar (Old Market), and a visit to Jharia town.

b) In the night, we were all invited to a dinner meet held at the BCCL Guest house and hosted by our beloved friend, Mr Satya Prakash Verma (now sadly deceased). Thus the two great and eventful days came to a glorious end, with all hearts filled with the warmth similar to that of taking part in a big family wedding.

I am personally humbled with the achievements of our batch mates who are receipt of various awards, in recognition to their contribution to Mining & Allied Industries, which has since changed so much.

1) A number of our friends have been awarded with the “Distinguished Alumni Award “by the school.

2) A number of our friends were in high offices in the Mining Industry, like Chairman - Coal India, CMDs and Directors in the various coal companies. We even had a friend winding his way through Coal, Cement and other mineral based industries, and ending up as a VP in the I T Industry’s flagship company of the times - CMC (Computer Maintenance Corporation).

One of us was the Dy. Director General of Mines & Minerals in Nepal.
Three of us rose to be Professors and Heads of Department of Mining in ISM, Jodhpur etc.
Three had migrated to the USA, working there in the industry, with one of them in the World Bank.
Three of us rose to be Professors and Head of Department of Mining at ISM, Jodhpur etc. and one amongst them retired as Director-in-Charge of ISM. It may be noted that Prof S P Banerjee got opportunity to work as Director-in-Charge of ISM with full powers of Director in 1994-95 as he could initiate some important steps in that short period (e.g. changing ISM entrance examination system to IIT Joint Entrance System, and was finally implemented in 1997. An honorary award in recognition of the pioneering work done by Prof G S Marwah (’47 Mining) him during his stewardship at School was given to him (D.Sc. Honoris Causa).
In the Indian Railways, we had one of us serving as the Chief Mining Advisor.
Two of us had occupied very senior posts in Oil Industry.
It is quite possible I might have omitted some other senior professionals in the industry, and I may be excused for my lapse, if any.

3)The Institution of Engineers - India , the premier technical organization in the country, in its first ever such awards bestowed to its members in the Mining Industry, awarded four of our batch mates, its prestigious award "In Honor of Outstanding Contribution in Mining Engineering Field".

4)MMGI, the premier organization in the Mining and Geological fields, had two of our friends as Presidents, and one of them had the very great honor of delivering the Holland Memorial Lecture at MMGI. Both of these received the Lawrence Holland medal of the Institution of Engineers, UK, for standing first in the A.M.I.Min.E. As UK examination.

My Thanks to all my 1957 batch mates & others:

Words cannot express my personal gratitude & satisfaction to one and all that were part of this historical moment, which we dream t and made it a reality. I also know we all travelled from across the country with our life partners and shared nostalgia of our school days together. It does make me feel nostalgic having been with you all there, and knew very well that those two days filled with fun and joy , we will be carrying with us all through our lives as one of the finest memories, as no one could ever predict as to when we would ever meet in such a gathering again.

Last but not the least - I shall be failing in my duty if I do not acknowledge my thanks to all the ladies, who made our trip more colorful and enjoyable. I must also thank all those who helped us to have this gala get-together, both from current students & academic staff or otherwise.

I welcome you all for this "Golden Jubilee celebrations of our batch” & believe in me we are the first who have celebrated G J in the history of ISM. I am sure our torch of love and affection for fellow mates will remain live as long as this great institution exists. We all hope that our future batches will follow – with more zeal and happiness of togetherness, this tradition.

Krishnamachary Srinivasan (’57 Mining)

^{09th July' 2013}

================================================================

Where we all spent our three days – 03^rd Feb to 05^th Feb’ 2007

No: 5 b– Mr and Mrs R K Roy and S N Jha

03^rd Feb’ 2007 –

Most of Goldie’s especially our group from Chennai arrived around 20.00 HR, and we were picked up by ISM school bus waiting outside Dhanbad Railway Station. We were joined by few of our friends – Prof S P Banerjee and Mrs and Mr D K Burman. Our first thought / to revive our old memories was to sip a tea at Ganesh Tea Stall which was our min watering station each time we crossed the Railway Station to Old or New Market or to come from Jharia after watching movies etc. as from here we would take cycle rickshaws to ISM Hostels. But we were shocked not to see any more this famous tea stall and even new owners had no idea of it.

Our Home Away from Home at ISM:

No: 5 c - E D Centre

We reached ISM campus and got down at EDC Guest House opposite to where our old Post Office was located in our days. To our pleasant surprise few of our mates, who had arrived earlier along with those who were residents of Dhanbad – Mr P Chowdhary, Mr H K Roy, Mr S N Jha, Mr R K Roy & Mr P C Shaym. We all registered at the center, rooms were allocated and we refreshed ourselves after a long journey to be part of this historical occasion.

Later around 10.00 pm we had our dinner in canteen run by contractors. It was almost reminded our days of sitting in our old mess for our food. We did have lots of fun, chit chatting and the ruckus we had created.

04^th Feb’ 2007

The next day was Basant Day and right from the morning we participated in all the program-mes, including some badminton, tennis games and sports, photo sessions, and distribution of some special gifts from the Basant organizing committee, there was a very pleasant session with members of the faculty and students, at the old hostel inside quadrangle.

No: 6 Badminton in progress

No: 7 Badminton in Progress in Old
Hostel Quadrangle

No: 8 Badminton in Progress in Old
Hostel Quadrangle

No: 9 P K Lahri – Trying his golfing skills with a
hockey stick, lower play ground

No: 10 Prof A K Ghosh (’56 Mining)
Ready to Serve

No:11 Badminton in Progress

No: 12 Badminton in Progress in
Old Hostel quadrangle

No: 13 Badminton in Progress in
Old Hostel quadrangle

Note the spouses of the 1957 batch alumni sitting on chairs watching the game.

We took great pleasure in revisiting the hostel rooms where once we had stayed during our school days, with our mates and spouses.

No: 14 Old Hostel Tour on Basant Day

No: 15 Old Hostel Tour on Basant Day

Note: Clearly visible are Prof. T. Kumar (the then Director, ISM), M L Malik, R K Roy, G Padmanabhan, P Choudhary, P K Lahiri, (Chairman, EB), S K Chowdhary and K Srinivasan


No: 16 Mrs D K Barman, Mrs Venkatraman and D K Barman on Old Hostel Corridor

No:17 – Aerial View of Mess from first floor of
Old Hostel

The old hostel had not changed at all, except that all the individual messes used to be run by us on a regional basis like the Punjabi, Madrassi, Bengali, Bihari, UP, and the Maharashtrian messes were all gone, and only a single large common mess was there. Also, the total strength of the School at about 160 in 1957, stood at almost a staggering figure of about 2000 +. The most interesting part was, the student strength had a large percentage of girls, which lent great colour to the campus, compared to the almost bone dry atmosphere, with an all-boys population of our times.

Inauguration of an Alumni Office

No: 18

No: 19

No: 18 R. Gupta (The then President ISMAA inaugurating Alumni Office) also seen Mr P K Lahri (Chairman, EB) and Prof T Kumar (then Director ISM) and S K Chowdhary :

No:19 R Gupta, P K Lahiri, Prof T Kumar and Mrs Bhaskar Bhattacharjee (’72 Mining).

(N.B. Bhaskar Bhattacharjee ('72 Mining) former D.G. of the Directorate-General of Mines Safety, died on October 26, 2006 in a tragic accident while holidaying in the Andaman s. ISMAA Executive Committee decided in 2006 to institute the ISMAA Distinguished Alumnus Award in his memory from the year 2007 and specially invited Mrs Bhaskar Bhattacharjee to the ISMAA Office inauguration ceremony and the first presentation of the ISMAA Distinguished Alumnus Award on Basant evening. A photograph of Late Bhaskar Bhattacharjee was hung on the Alumni office wall).

No: 20

No: 21

No: 22

No: 23 - K Srinivasan and H K Roy stepping into
Alumni Office, Prof S P Banerjee extreme
right in white shirt and pant.

Note: ISM Alumni Office after inauguration – Group Photo – few stalwarts’ namely visible are - Ramendra Gupta (’72 Mining -ISMAA President in front row), Satish Puri (‘75 Mining), who became DG, DGMS later at extreme right), Prof. T Kumar (the then Director, ISM), S K Chowdhary and Prof. S. P. Banerjee at centre on second row. And all other 1957 batch alumni are standing on back rows.

At around 08:00 HRS- We had our breakfast, and by then few more mates had joined us, namely – Mr I Kumar, Mr M L Malik, Mr Bijoy Mazumdar and Mr S K Bagchi and we all had a breakfast and got into Golden Jubilee ISM bus waiting for us to be transported.

No: 24 – Goldie’s waiting to board the
G J ISM Bus

No 25 - Goldie's going to enjoy ride
in ISM Bus

to Tennis Courts situated behind 24 room ‘New Hostel’, which area was known in our times Dhaiya (outside campus) – which also reminded our tea session and gossips at that stall, while we used to go for walks after our dinner in Old Hostel (now named as Diamond Hostel).

The entire organising committee, alumni from earlier and later batches, with current students had some fun – when we played few games & participated in sports, like Badminton, Table Tennis, Hockey, racing for young children etc. It was very good that Organising Committee had arranged Professional Photographer to capture the events as they happened.

At around 11:00 HRS- We had a tea session, after which we shifted to old hostel inner quadrangle where we had informal chat with current students, answering there questions & our experiences of our days at school & in the Mining Industry. This was followed by few Badminton matches, just to warm up and was enjoyed by our mates.

At around 12:00 noon – We then moved to New Office of ‘ISM Alumni Association’ a place allocated & dedicated by school on the eastern side of Main ISM Building.

ISM alumni association office was inaugurated by Mr R Gupta President of ISMAA in the presence of Director T Kumar and our mates.


No: 26 Group Photo of ISM Faculty and ISM Alumni after inauguration of Alumni Office

No: 27 Group Photo taken of the 1957 batch alumni present
at the time of inauguration of the Alumni office along with
Prof. T. Kumar at the center.

The names of the 15, 1957 batch alumni (from L to R) are:

L to R: Mr S N Jha*, Mr P C Shyam*, Mr P Choudhary, Prof. B K Mozumdar, Mr H. K.Roy*,

Mr G Padmanabhan, Mr K Srinivasan, Prof. T. Kumar (Director, ISM),

Mr D K Barman, Mr S K Chowdhary, Mr R K Roy*, Prof. S. P. Banerjee, Mr S K Bagchi,

Mr M L Malik, Mr B Dharam and Mr Indra Kumar.

Mr S P Varma*, who also attended the Get-together is missing in this photograph.

Our Tributes to1957 Alumni (marked with an asterisk after their name) have since expired.

Later we were taken around this alumni hall – which had photographs & other memorabilia of the association. (Refer photos – 28 – 33).

Following Photos 28 to 33 relate to opening of ISMAA Office on 4^th morning and shows the persons making a tour of the office.

No: 28 Mrs. Bhaskar Bhattacharjee and her son looking at the photograph of Late Bhaskar Bhattacharjee hung on ISMAA office wall.

No: 29

No: 30

No:31

No: 32

No 33

No:34

This was followed by enjoying well decorated oval of ISM main Building with flower show and some paintings exhibited by staff members and their families.

At around 13:00 HRS -

No: 35

No: 36

Luncheons in Progress

It was lunch time and we all sat in common mess at Old Hostel Ground Floor, where platters of excellent food awaited us and we all had sumptuous lunch to fill much needed empty stomachs energy. I have to say, we did fondly remember our days, when we had Punjabi, Madrasi, Bengali and Bihar mess. Also huge grinding stone for grinding rice & dal for making dosa - which was brought from Madras by our seniors, as usually Masala & Plain Dosa was served as a breakfast on Sundays. Regretfully this was not found.

After lunch – we all retired to our rooms for afternoon nap & siesta much needed for our aging body, and did not had flexible and tough body of school times any more.

At around 16:00 HRS -

No: 37 Registration Counter at the entrance
of Lower Football Ground

No:38

No: 39 Food Stalls serviced by ISM
Dipti Ladies Club

No: 40 Food Stalls serviced by ISM
Dipti Ladies Club

In the evening we gathered for yet another ‘Great Group Gathering at Lower Play Grounds’ and after being registered at the reception (coughing up Rs 500/- per couple) we all went round to see lot of stalls put up by current students, members of staff & their families. It was fun trying our hands on some of the games – like lucky dip, enjoying some delicious snacks with coffee or tea. This place it also allowed us to meet older friends from other batches – who had come all the way to enjoy Basant festivities with their family and children. However our interaction was mostly with older friends or our batch mates. However with younger group our interaction was much reserved.

At around 18:00 HRS -

No: 41 ISMAA General Body
Meeting in Progress

No:42 R Gupta
(ISMAA President)

Photo 41: ISMAA General Body Meeting in Progress. Mr P K Lahiri (Chairman, EB) is flanked by Prof. T Kumar (then Director, ISM) and Mr Ramendra Gupta (ISMAA President). Mr Biswajit Paul and Mr Alok Mukhopadhyay are sitting on right of Prof. T Kumar

Photo 42: Mr Ramendra Gupta (ISMAA President) conducting the General Body Meeting in G J Auditorium.

No: 43

No:44

Photos 43 and 44: Two views of the audience attending the ISMAA General Body Meeting in G J Auditorium

No: 45

No:46

Photo 45: Dr. Biswajit Paul (ISMAA Treasurer) presenting the Accounts at the General Body Meeting in G J Auditorium

Photo 46: K Srinivasan speaking on behalf of the 1957 batch at the General Body Meeting in G J Auditorium.

We had an attendance of around 100 guests for Annual General Body Meeting of ISM Alumni Association which was held at the new auditorium (called GJ Auditorium), just outside of Mining Machinery Block. However students remained busy as they were getting ready for cultural program-me which was lined up next.

At around 19:00 HRS -

The cultural program-me started and at the venue the hall was very well decorated and almost all students, along with staff members their families, old alumni and we Goldie’s. The function started with an invocation, lighting of lamp by Prof A K Ghosh and welcome address. The cultural events followed with music, skits, dramas which continued till late evening.

No: 47

Photo 47: Prof A K Ghose ('56 Mining) lighting the lamp

at the start of the cultural program-me

Some items of the cultural program-me in progress – can be seen in photos 48 – 52.

No:48

No: 49

No: 50

No: 51

No:52

Later we were formally introduced individually to audience as members of the FIRST EVER GOLDEN JUBILEE ALUMNI 1957 BATCH who made to portals of ISM.

No: 53 – G J Memento

All Goldie’s were given special memento to mark the occasion with great fanfare.

No: 54

No:55

Photo 54: B Dharam receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 55: S P Verma receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

No: 56

No:57

Photo 56: D K Burman receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 57: S K Bagchi receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

No: 58

No:59

Photo 58: R K Roy displaying the GJ Memento after receiving it from
Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 59: G Padmanabhan receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

No: 60

No:61

Photo 60: Inder Kumar receiving G J Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 61: H K Roy receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

No: 62

No: 63

Photo 62: Prof. B K Mozumdar receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 63: P C Shyam receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

No: 65

No: 64

Photo 64: M L Malik receiving GJ Memento from Shri P K Lahiri

Photo 65: S N Jha receiving GJ Memento from Shri P K Lahiri

No: 66

No: 67

Photo 66: Prof. S P Banerjee receiving GJ Memento from Shri P K Lahiri

Photo 67: S K Chowdhary receiving GJ Memento from Shri P K Lahiri

No: 68

No:69

Photo 68: K Srinivasan receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 69: P Choudhary receiving GJ Memento from Mr P K Lahiri

Basant Samman Award & Distinguished Alumnus Award Given to:

The Distinguished Alumnus Award has been instituted in 2006 by Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad through funds provided by ISMAA in memory of Late Mr Bhaskar Bhattacharjee, former Director General, DGMS and a distinguished alumnus of ISM. Prof G S Marwaha was the first recipient of the Award.

No 70

No: 70 a

No: 70 & 70 a Mrs Navjot Kaur d/o Prof G S Marwah (’47 Mining)

receiving ISMAA Distinguished Alumnus Award from Mr P K Lahri

Photo 70 and 70 a: Mrs. Navjyot Kaur (also known by her nickname ‘Nikki’, younger daughter of Prof. G. S. Marwaha (1947 ME) and former Director, ISM receiving ISMAA Distinguished Alumnus Award on behalf of her late father from Mr P K Lahiri.

No: 71

No:72

Photo 71: Prof. O. P. Varma receiving Basant Samman Award from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 72: Mr B.N. Mukherjee (‘47 Mining) receiving Basant Samman Award from Mr P K Lahiri

Note:

1. Basant Samman is a prestigious award instituted by ISM Alumni Association in the year 2004 to honor the faculty members of ISM who have distinguished themselves.

2. Distinguished Alumni and Distinguished Technocrats who have contributed significantly to the activities of ISM and ISM Alumni Association are also eligible to receive the award. There is a provision of a maximum of five such awards every year. Past receipants included Prof D Chandra, Prof S P Banerjee, Prof R R Khanna, Prof R K Verma and Prof P R Prasad.

No: 73

No:74

Photo 73: Prof A K Ghose receiving Basant Samman Award from Mr P K Lahiri

Photo 74: Prof T C Rao receiving Basant Samman Award from Mr P K Lahiri

No:76

No:77

Photo 76: Mr B.N. Mukherjee ('47 Mining) receiving Basant Samman Award memento from Mr R Gupta.

Photo 77: Prof. T C Rao receiving Basant Samman Award memento from Mr R Gupta

CONGRATULATIONS:

No:78

No:79

Photo 78: Prof. O P Varma being congratulated by Prof. T Kumar
on receiving Basant Samman Award

Photo 79: Prof. A K Ghose being congratulated by Mr M M Sharma,
DG-DGMS on receiving Basant Samman Award

No: 80 Prof A K Ghosh receiving award from
Director T Kumar

Photo 80: Prof. A K Ghose being congratulated by Prof. T Kumar on receiving Basant Samman Award

No: 81

No: 82

Photo 81: Prof. T C Rao being congratulated by Prof. T Kumar on his receiving Basant Samman Award

Photo 82: Mr B.N. Mukherjee (‘47 Mining) being congratulated by Prof. T Kumar on his receiving Basant Samman Award

We all enjoyed and kept us busy whole evening. It was on the whole, a very thoroughly delightful and lovely time we spent together.

At around 21:00 HRS -

Later we were invited for a grand dinner at old hostel dining hall; we all had sumptuous meal to our satisfaction, coupled with lot of chit chatting. There was lot of love & affection shown in meeting our old pals and their families, but in the end we all had a tinge of sadness as the day was coming to close.

At around 22:00 HRS -

We all came back to EDC to finalise our plans for next day. After breakfast on 05^th Feb’ 2007, we would have session of gossip and lots of tea and coffee session.

In the meanwhile few of our friends had booked there departure same night, and we fondly bid farewell to them. Later around midnight we retired to our rooms for yet another satisfying night.

05^th Feb’ 2007 –

08:00 HRS – 18:00 HRS

It was planned earlier that 05^th Feb will be the day to be spent among Goldie’s and their families, so we assembled in the dining hall – had hearty breakfast & lots of talking, cutting jokes and enjoying to our thrill every bit of time at our disposal.

After breakfast we assembled at the conference hall – introducing ourselves for the benefit of our spouses. We talked about our family, our children, shared photographs etc. Mr R K Roy who unfortunately is no more with us, distributed copies of his entire family photos including his grandchildren – numbering almost staggering figure of 50.

We encouraged our spouses to talk freely of what they thought about us, their life experiences in the mining and allied industry with plus and minus points of it. To our surprise most told about negative points, but we could see that we all behaved almost like our school days, even though we are now Goldie’s.

Around lunch time, we assembled in the canteen, had some photo session in groups etc., while drawing program-me for rest of the evening.

No: 83

No: 84

Photo 83: Gossiping at the EDC Canteen. Present PC Shyam, R K Roy, S. K. Bagchi, M L Malik, S N Jha and B Dharam

Photo 84: Group Photo in EDC meeting hall. R K Roy, G Padmanabhan, D K Barman, I Kumar, S N Jha, P Choudhary

No 85 Group Photo

No: 86 Group of 1957 batch spouses in EDC meeting Hall

Photo 86: L to R Mrs. P Choudhary, Mrs.PC Shyam, Mrs. R K Roy, Mrs. S N Jha, Mrs. S P Banerjee, Mrs. H K Roy, Mrs. K Srinivasan and Mrs. K Venkataraman.

No: 87 Group Photo with Spouses on EDC Quadrangle

Sitting L to R: Mrs. R K Roy, Mrs. S N Jha, Mrs. K Srinivasan Mrs S P Banerjee, Mrs. P Choudhary, Mrs.P C Shyam, Mrs. H K Roy, and Mrs. D K Barman

Standing L to R: P Choudhary, S N Jha, K Srinivasan, P C Shyam, H K Roy, D K Barman and R K Roy,

No: 88 - Group Photo of our spouses – who also made to this day.

Photo 88: Mrs D K Barman, Mrs P Choudhary, Mrs S N Jha, Mrs S P Banerjee, Mrs R K Roy, Mrs K Srinivasan and Mrs. H K Roy

No: 89 - Group Photo of our spouses – who also made to this day.

L to R: Mrs H K Roy, Mrs K Srinivasan, Mrs R K Roy, Mrs S N Jha, Mrs S P Banerjee,

Mrs P Choudhary, Mrs D K Barman, Mrs K Venkatraman & Mrs P C Shyam.

In the afternoon - we did make a trip to Jharia also, which was like a Ghost Town as we were looking for Vihar Talkies & Deshbandhu Cinema’s where some of our evening we had spent during school days. What we saw in our journey both sides; was lot of smoke – as we all know Jharia Coal Field is on fire for many decades. On our return we did visit Lakshmi Narain Temple at Dhansar more offered our prayers. We also did a short halt at Bank More – and walked around Rathore Mansion.

Later in the evening, we had desire to visit our school days’ where we used to loaf around –

Jagjivan Nagar & Purana Bazzar (old market near Railway Station).

Hirapur – We did not find Dinu’s shop where we used to eat Singaras, Kheer Kadam etc. like we missed Ganesh Tea Shop near Railway Station.

18:00 HRS – 23:00 HRS

Late Mr S P Verma invited us all to BCCL Guest House for a dinner. As we were getting ready; to our surprise Mr Ram Babu Bansal (1956 ISM) walked in and invited all of us to Asansol for a dinner. Sadly we could not accommodate his request, since we were committed elsewhere – but on behalf of all of us Mr M L Malik & Mr Inder Kumar joined him – and also to keep spirit of togetherness alive.

We enjoyed dinner to our fill, and as we were leaving BCCL Guest House, we all felt sense of fulfillment of meeting & greeting our mates. Not to mention we also met so many friends who joined this day; but we also had a feel of sadness – as we were all parting & going in different directions on our way back home, not being sure when we will ever meet again.

As we celebrated our re-union, its with great sadness – to inform our fellow friends that we lost soon after G J, four more mates namely: Mr P C Shyam, Mr S N Jha, Mr H K Roy, Mr R K Roy to whom we cannot forget, and our tributes goes to all of them from the bottom of my heart. At least we met them once last time at G J.

We retired late close to mid night, after settling all bills of EDC for boarding and lodging etc.

06^th Feb’ 2007 –

We are well ready in the morning, bus was there to drop us to Dhanbad Railway Station – we all left with heavy heart, but with greatest feeling of satisfaction that our dream has been fulfilled - to have this wonderful experience of togetherness with all those whom we met 50 years ago as young boys for our study tenure at ISM.

In short this celebration gave us:

“A THRILLING EXPERIENCE ENJOYED ONCE IN LIFE TIME”

Isn’t that TRUE! Which I also believe will never happen again.

From writer’s Desk:

My thanks & acknowledgement goes to all my seniors & my mates, who have inspired me, to what little I am blogging today. My personal thanks go to Prof S P Banerjee, who had sent me his humble request why not I write blog for his batch and pave way of recording their batch memories. My special thanks go to Mr K Srinivasan who helped ME to accomplish my journey with details out of his memory, EVEN when he had lost all his files & personal treasure when he had his computer crash.

I believe my relationship built up over years has grown four fold and fondness of my Alma Mater, in recording memories through my blogs is a greater thrill as I write through other eyes in my words for all those who made it and all who could not make it. Today I have been able to complete my blog, with great joy & happiness with wet eyes for those whom we send our hearty tributes.

I have enjoyed what little I had for 1957 batch but have written in my own way to bring out the nostalgia of the bye-gone days. It must have been great satisfaction to all those who attended and participated in this G J Celebrations to carry with them these beautiful memories now recorded for life time. I believe our mates children will one day also rejoice – when they would look for their Dad’s contribution to Mining Industry and ISM Global community as a whole.

Lastly now ball is in the courts of 1964 batch, and we wish them all the success and that they keep the momentum on – going, keeping in mind, time will just fly out, and we will see them at next “Basant of Feb’ 2014”. I wonder if I could know who is organizing and we are there to help for contact details, with whom we are connected.

“LONG LIVE ISM LONG LIVE ITS UNIQUE TRADITIONS AND BONDS OF FRIENDSHIP – ONCE FRIENDS AT SCHOOL – ARE FRIENDS FOR EVER”

I will pen down here, and look forward to write blog for 1964 batch in 2014 although few other blogs I have in mind and are still in draft stage – due to incomplete input I have in my hand

ArunTalwar (’71 Mining) - 09^th July’ 2013

Note: All photos have been kept at my Picasa web album; if someone is interested to see all photos as in blogs we have used the ones which kept our blog flow.

https://picasaweb.google.com/115933331088209325388/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb200705thFeb20071957Batch?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJDepOnR7biZIw&feat=directlink

Smiling faces - Jab We Met

No: 90 - Group Photos with our spouses at Dhaiya Sports Ground

Sitting L to R: Mrs R K Roy, Mrs P C Shyam, Mrs D K Barman, Mrs K Venkataraman, Mrs K Srinivasan, Mrs B K Mozumdar, Mrs G Padmanabhan, Mrs S. K. Bagchi, Mrs H K Roy, Mrs S P Banerjee, Mrs Swapan De Choudhury and a young lady (particulars not known)

Standing L to R: S N Jha, R K Roy, P C Shyam, M L Malik, Inder Kumar, D K Barman, K Srinivasan, B K Mozumdar, G Padmanabhan, S. K. Bagchi, H K Roy, B Dharam, S P Banerjee, Swapan De Choudhury (‘63 Mining) and P Choudhary

****************---------------The End---------------------**********

Golden Jubilee 1963 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2013 (By Partap K Mishra- '63 Petroleum Technology):

2013-06-23T16:30:00.000-07:00

Let me start by adding up our historical group photo of 62 students who made it for this year Golden Jubilee Celebrations out of total contacted and complied batch mates list of 143. You can see how smartly and happy faces have posed for this shot. All must be thinking in their hearts, whether they will ever share this moment full of joy & pride once again after 50 years, when they first entered ISM.

No: 1 - Group Photo of Goldie’s

Trip Down Memory Lane:

In the last couple of years, I had compiled & posted “Golden Jubilee celebrations for 1960, 1961 and 1962 batches in my blogs, which was read with great enthusiasm all around the globe, and still gets lot of hits. But once again I am back, to complete this blog for 1963 batch. I can now let all know, it was 1957 batch led by Prof S P Banerjee (’57 Mining) who went to ISM portals of our Alma mater for their 50 years reunion, and laid down the foundation / tradition for future batches to follow. This was followed by 1960 on a low key, going to 1961, 1962 which made it a great success with pomp and show, and this year 1963 have achieved yet another mile stone by stepping on the ISM grounds some after 50 years of passing out.

Statistically as per Google, our blogs viewed so far has crossed a figure of more than 37,000 people who have viewed and read so far, which means in the last 28 months, when I first started blogging, so people do read activities of our esteem Alma mater every month around the globe. It’s a great satisfaction and an inspiration to keep me busy to write and record our memories as some send me thanks or some will call me that you brought me back to school days. My thanks to one and all who have sent, or who have read it and enjoyed, what they missed as being one of the participants themselves. Thanks for this internet age which has brought us closer than ever before.

Golden Jubilee blogs for 1960, 1961 & 1962 batch can be read by clicking an opening new window to read:

https://picasaweb.google.com/115933331088209325388/GoldenJubilee1963BatchReunionFeb2ndTo4thFeb2013?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJCj07-a5oWhfg&feat=directlink

Golden Jubilee 1963 Batch Reunion – A Report by Pratap K Mishra-'63 Petroleum & Basant – 2013 (Feb 2 -4, 2013):

No 2 – Main School Building

Golden Jubilee — Alas 50 years since our 1963 batch graduated from the Alma Mater, whose glorious history and traditions are next to none. We are proud how closely knit is our family that our mates do not need any introductions while meeting their academic staff, seniors, and juniors both in our home country and around the globe & we welcome and host them, and help them in various ways. Our age old tradition has kept alive since the School started imparting different mineral engineering courses from 1926 to this day, when school has added so many feathers to her cap.

In our times most of alumni after passing out especially those from Mining used to work in and around Dhanbad and few still used to work in other parts of the country; or with the G S I that had its headquarters in not-far-off Calcutta (now called Kolkata). The Alumni used to visit there Alma Mater more often, due to their association with very close junior students, faculty etc. But most importantly for preparing for their Second and First Class Mine Manager’s Certificate of Competency (Coal and Metal) examinations as they used to share hostels with juniors and get study environment which at either there home or work place did not offer. Not to say, they used to participate with their families to join Annual Basant festivals – wonder when this wonderful event of Basant started at ISM!!!! I believe once a year meeting, playing etc. – did great job of mingling with current students and this age old tradition remains alive to this day.

As we all know ISM started in the year 1926 with Mining and Geology as main streams being imparted then. In 1957, two new courses – Petroleum Technology and Applied Geophysics – were added, and with this also expanded our mineral industry in the country. ISM completed its 50 years of its existence in the year 1976. Golden Jubilees of the Departments of Petroleum and Applied Geophysics were celebrated by ISM separately in 2007, which also provided opportunities for a good number of alumni of these disciplines to gather at the Alma mater and rejoice meeting their old pals / mates.

Today our ISM alumni are spread out to many parts of the country and abroad to USA, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand to mention a few. But still we all enjoy the same common bondage and are ready to help our students or welcome them whenever they come to our part of the city or world.

Later meetings and close interaction between all the alumni, the current students and faculty became difficult not for all but for those who made their home abroad.

The Golden Jubilee celebrations therefore came as a blessing in disguise, that it has again made meeting & greeting your batch mates, current students, faculty staff and interacting with Goldie’s of senior batches etc.

The first re-union took place for 1957 batch at a low key, followed by 1960 batch when foundations of G J Celebrations was laid, its vision & scale of celebrations increased progressively and alumni of 1961 and 1962 batch had it with great pomp and show.

By this time, communications and linkages between students, faculty and alumni had improved tremendously thanks to the maturing of the digital / internet era; and the blooming of active units of ISM Alumni Association – the ISMAANA, ISMAA, Delhi, Calcutta, and Bombay who host annual eventful get together every year.

Alumni of the ISM Class of 1963 got their inspiration from their seniors as is the ISM tradition; and started preliminary preparations nearly a year and half back through informal get-together s of groups of alumni.

Some of the prime movers and few others who helped us to make it a success namely are:

1. Prime Initiator - M S Chhabra. / Coordinator - R Bhaskaran.

2. Dhanbad team - S N Tewari, K.N.Singh and Bharat Singh. (Co-ordination with ISM authorities, for accommodation & logistics for participants etc.)

3. Delhi Team - Adarsh Jethi, Deepak Chawla, Ajay Khanna, Swadesh P Mehra & V N Mehta. (Responsible for collecting funds managing bank accounts & also organizing for publication of the Souvenir). / Remote support - H K Gupta, G C Munot.

4. Profiles Edited - Gyan Rajhans, U B Acharya & P K Mishra / Final editor - S V Ali.

5. Interaction – with other alumni around the globe, who gave us much needed support. Needless to say, that we may have missed so many who contributed to our efforts for this reunion.

The ISM Class of 1959-63 had an intake of 150 students 90 Mining + 20 each AGL (Applied Geology), AGP (Applied Geophysics) & P Tech (as it was called then). But due to direct entry of students to AGL & AGP courses in the 2 Year, this number increased or decreased as few joined & few opted out to join other institutions etc. Also few used to spend another year (continuation of A G L graduates) for obtaining an additional diploma in Mining. However, we could compile info for 143 batch mates, and details of many could not be obtained or confirmed even with the best of our efforts to locate them. Out of which 28 of batch had left for heavenly abode & we prayed in our hearts as we dearly missed them.

However 62 batch mates participated; 42 of them with their spouses, 17 of them singly; and 3 with only children/grandchildren - such was the enthusiasm shown by those who did participated. Considering that we could compile a list of 143 names, 28 of whom have departed to their heavenly abode, and several could not be contacted. Out of 20 (twenty) enrolled in our P. Tech branch, 5 are no more with us in this world. Of the remaining 15, 8 (eight) batch mates participated including 4 from USA / Canada.

Branch-wise participation numbers were 44 Mining; 5 Applied Geology; 5 Applied Geophysics; and 8 from P.Tech. Nine of the batch mates, 3 with their spouses, had come all the way from the USA, Canada and Bahrain.

Our hearts also goes for those who could not join for some compelling unforeseen reason and few who had to cancel their participation at the last moment. As rightly said who knows what is 2 morrow, history thus has been made and yet added another feather in the cap to all those who made it to ISM portals from our batch.

List for Goldie's:

62 Goldie's who made History

Where We All spent our Three days – 02^nd Feb to 04^th Feb’ 2013:

No:3 - Executive Development Center

Goldie’s from outstation started arriving from the 1^st February with the majority arriving on the 2^nd Feb’ 2013. We were mostly accommodated (except a few who opted for other Guest Houses/Hotel accommodations) at the Executive Development Center (E D C) in the campus where all our meetings were also held.

Mr. U B Acharya was master of ceremony for all these formal & informal meetings. Few were accommodated at Dhanbad Circuit House, Guest Houses of Mining-related organizations and hotels based on participants preferences.

The G J schedule is shown on left:

On Saturday the 02^nd Feb’ 2013:

The Conference Hall in E D C had started humming with batch mates and their spouses & family members, wherein we greeted with lot of back patting and hugging each other, exchanging notes. A moment well rewarded as we all waited anxiously for this day. The excitement, echoes and so much to murmur of past was unbelievable. Since there was no formal agenda it was followed by self-introduction by batch mates & spouses / family members present, and lot of us refreshed our old memories, and also for the benefit of spouses present, with a break for lunch at the E D C Dining Hall.

No 5: - Mr T K Lahiry CMD-BCCL

No 4:- Dr D C Panigrahi
(ISM Director)

Later, Director, ISM Dr. D C Panigrahi (’84 Mining) came over and released the ‘Souvenir of ISM Class of 1963 Golden Jubilee’, along with Mr. T K Lahiry CMD-BCCL who the addressed the gathering. Mr. Lahiry also provided excellent support (including financial support), for the Golden Jubilee class of 1963.

I need to mention tireless efforts of Mr. G C Mrig (’58 Mining) & Mr N N Gautam (’62 Mining) who provided much needed support & help. Mr. N N Gautam spoke about the great ISM-bonding, and the ambitious plan of Delhi Chapter to develop an ISM Alumni Complex / Guest House in Delhi, on the lines of the one set up by ISMAA, Mumbai which is operating for past several years for the benefit of alumni, students and faculty members visiting Delhi.

No:6 - Cultural Function hosted by BCCL

Later in the evening - C & M D, BCCL had organized a lively cultural / musical program me at BCCL auditorium in Koyla Nagar, which was followed by sumptuous dinner for all of us including our spouses etc. It was a wonderful evening enjoyed by all, with exchange of notes not only among batch mates but also with alumni officials working with BCCL and other staff from local industry.

On Sunday the 03^rd Feb’ 2013:

No:7 - L to R: Basant Awardees- 2013

- 1-?,2-?, 3-?, 4- N N Gautam, 5- ?,
6- Harsh Gupta, 7-D Pichamuthu(?), 8-T K lahiry,
9- ??, 10-Dr Panigrahi,
11-12-13-14-????

The ISM campus was bustling with Basant excitement of students and alumni on the 3^rd February, the day of Basant 2013. Most of the G J Goldie’s traveled in the morning to Birsa Munda Park in the city outskirts, and planted sapling of trees to mark the celebrations and later participated in the ‘Basant’ functions at school campus.

No: 9 Mrs and Mr S N Tewari

No:8 Mrs and Mr P K Mishra

Later, most of us with spouses/families, walked around the campus, looking with nostalgia for the hostels and rooms where we once stayed to let our spouses see – including Historical Tank Shop which was converted into a hostel and commissioned in 1959 and occupied for the 1^st time by the Class of 1963; and rooms in the Old Hostel, (Now renamed as Diamond Hostel); the L-Shaped Hostel; and vainly looked for the Lower & Upper Barracks which do not exist today. All old structures, like (Tank Shop am told still exists and possibly being used as warehouse), Upper & Lower Barracks have been demolished to accommodate new buildings, adding new infrastructure to ISM assets. The tiny stand-alone cottage housing the ISMAG Post Office (a place no one will forget as we used to look for our money orders, and letters from our parents etc) is also not in existence, and many new faculty buildings, hostels have come up, which have changed total landscape which was difficult to dream unless we saw with our own eyes.

I would recommend the blog written by our alumni {Arun Talwar (’71 Mining)} – What I left and what is Now, will take your trip down memory lane – the link is below:

http://memories-indianschoolofminesdays.blogspot.co.nz/2012/04/ism-what-i-left-and-what-is-now.html

Afternoon lunch was hosted by Manager of Tata Collieries, Jamadoba (whose GM was an ISM alumnus) at ISM on the 3^rd Feb on the occasion of Basant. The venue was changed from Jamadoba to school campus to avoid loss of time in travel etc.

Later in the afternoon we had our group photographs taken and after that some of us got our photos taken with smaller groups of close buddies. Few of them have been placed below. Since our number was large, we could not take a shot at our ISM Main Building in the back drop.

Time just flew away and we carry with us, great memories / some nostalgic feelings indented in our hearts & will be with us till our last breath, these were the words echoing in every one hearts. Some of those glimpses can be seen below in photos, namely photo No 10 – 18.

No: 10 – We all adore and Salute ISM to impart best of education

No: 11 and 12 - Goldie’s Group Photos

No: 13 - Goldie’s Group Photos

No: 14 - Goldie’s Group Photos

No:15 and16 - Goldie’s Spouses Group Photos

No:17 - L to R: U B Acharya, A K Rudra, Ajay Khanna,

Deepak Chawla & G P Mathur ?

No. 18 L to R: G S Garcha, T L Aggarwal, ??, ??,

Mrs K M Agarwal, K M Agarwal,

P N Keshari & M M P Karan

Some of the Basant festivities like sports, badminton, kite flying, play of cards – bridge etc. along with stalls set up by students making it full of fan-fair etc. Not to forget to mention the closeness that Mr. David V. Pichamuthu (’60 Mining) on his arrival to the EDC late afternoon, that he played a few hands of Bridge with alumni of Class of 1963. Thus making us all feel being part of the same family.

No: 19 and 20 - Badminton in progress, both alumni and students participated.

No: 21 and 22 - Stalls set up by students.

No:23 - Current students having group photo in front of stalls,
how enthusiastic they were to welcome Goldie’s.

No:24 and 25 - Kite flying mark every Basant Function & we all enjoyed watching school students.

No: 25 ( PE ) - Group Photo

Later in the afternoon, we were invited by the current students of Faculty of Petroleum Engineering, the P. Tech alumni of Class of 1963 visited the department, and interacted with students who were very curious to know how we managed our times, our professional experiences, and answered queries on possible careers etc. It was a nice homely feeling to be able to interact with students 50 years and more one’s own junior, and gets their attention and respect. Alumni of other disciplines also had similar experiences.

However Applied Geophysics department organized interactive session on relative free morning of 04^th Feb’ 2013 with Goldie’s. It was a fruitful session from student point of view.

Award Ceremony – Venue Lower Play Grounds:

No: 26 – Invocation Song

Basant festivities were already on at the Lower Ground with stalls set up by students with lots of fun fair. The official Basant function started in the evening at the Lower Ground. After Welcome of Guests; Invocation Song; and a Welcome Dance, bouquets of flower were presented to the Dignitaries on the dais comprising:

Prof. D C Panigrahi, Director, ISM & Patron, ISMAA & Basant

Mr T K Lahiry, CMD, BCCL & President, ISMAA

Col. M K Singh, Registrar, ISM

Prof. M Jawed, Prof. & Head, Mining Engineering and Vice-President, ISMAA

Prof. Phalguni Sen, Convenor, Basant 2013

Mr Sunil Kumar Barnwal, IAS, Labour Commissioner, Jharkhand and Vice-President, ISMAA

Mr Prem Sagar Mishra, General Manager, BCCL and General Secretary, ISMAA

No: 27 - Lighting of lamp by Prof D C Panigrahi.

Prof. P Sen, Convenor, Basant 2013 delivered the Welcome Address, followed by addresses by Director, ISM and Patron, ISMAA Prof. D.C.Panigrahi; and by Mr. T K Lahiry, CMD, BCCL and President, ISMAA.

Basant Samman, 2013 was awarded by Prof. Panigrahi & Mr. T K Lahiry for their outstanding achievements and contributions to:

Padma Shree Prof. Harsh K.Gupta (‘63 Applied Geophysics);

Mr. David V.Pichamuthu (’60 Mining).

No: 28 and 29 - Left Photo: Mr Harsh K Gupta (’63 Appl Gph) & Right Photo: Mr David V Pichamuthu (’60 Mining) receiving his Award

Mr. David Pichamuthu (’60 Mining) – Award for his outstanding Sports Man at ISM - His citations reflected the high level of achievement, and contribution in the field of sports. His record in High Jump & Pole Vault in ISM during his studentship in the year 1957- 60 still remained unbeaten to this day. In addition, on his debut for Bihar in Ranji Trophy he carried his bat through the innings (i.e. opened the innings and remained unbeaten when the whole team was all out) which is also till date a record / fete not yet conquered by any one.

And to:

3. Mr. S. Narsing Rao, Chairman, Coal India Ltd;

4. Dr. Dalim Kumar Paul (IIT- Khargpur), one time Director, ISM;

No:30 - ??

No:31 ??

Bhaskar Bhattacharya Memorial Distinguished Alumnus Award, 2013:
They were presented by Prof. Panigrahi to

Mr. Nitya Nand Gautam (‘62 Mining); and

Mr. T K Lahiry (’76 Mining) CMD, BCCL & President, ISMAA

No:32 N N Gautam ('62 Mining) receiving his award

No: 33 Missing photo Mr T K Lahiry?

The awards function comprised:

Reading of citation for each individual receiving award;

Presentation of Sanman, Sanman Patra & Shawl to the ‘Basant Sanman’ awardes, and awards to Distinguished Alumni’ by Prof. Panigrahi, Director, ISM & Patron ISMAA & Basant. At the end of award ceremony, they spoke few words – which added nostalgia.

Mr G C Manot ('63 Mining) distributed Ganesh Marble Idol to all participants.
Blazers with ISM logo (benevolently sponsored by our alumni), tailored to individual measurements to batch-mates who celebrated re-union at ISM. Small purses to spouses. The following alumni of Class of 1963 reunion were felicitated by presentation of shawls for their contributions to make the G J program-me successful. See photos below namely 34 -41.

No:34 ??

No:35 J K Tuli

No: 36 R M Purekar

No:37 Harsh K Gupta

No:38 ??

No:39 S N Tiwari

No:40 ??

No:41 R Bhaskaran


No: 42 - Evening Program-me at Lower Grounds – being enjoyed by guests and school students.

Later in the evening was the main entertainment program-me of the Basant function at ISM lower grounds.

Unlike past, it was all professional artists some of them well known TV artists. The cultural program-me included a celebrity Mr. Debojit Saha. The program-me was enjoyed by us, students, faculty and all those who filled the ground as can be seen from photo above.

In our days it was essentially staged by the students. Some of old photos from our batch treasure trove of Basant function how we used to enjoy - will revive old nostalgic memories of college days (1959 – 1963) and have been kept in next section Nostalgia by Photos & school days memories of the time we were at school. (Photo nos: 56 – 57).

But this time it was all professional artists some of them well known TV artists.

It was heartening to hear Dr. D K Paul, who had come over from IIT, Kharagpur to take charge as Director, ISM, how he was apprehensive on the appointment at ISM which was always viewed by IIT, Kharagpur as a rival in Mining Engineering studies, but was accepted at ISM with open arms and found the ISM a unique institution in its long tradition of bonhomie amongst students, alumni and faculty which no other educational institutions - including IIT’s have.

The Basant Dinner was hosted by ISM which was all enjoyed to our fill with lot of chit chatting.

Vote of Thanks:

The award function was followed by a Vote of Thanks by Mr. P S Mishra, General Secretary, and ISMAA; a few alumni recounting and sharing their experiences on request of the organizers; and a rich cultural program-me that lasted till late. The cultural program-me included a celebrity program-me by Mr Debojit Saha. The program-me was enjoyed by us, students, faculty and others filling the Lower Ground.

We all enjoyed the program me to our utmost thrill and excitement, however the sequence could not be adhered to due to the excitement of meeting batch mates and families, some after a gap of 50 years. It was my day and I believe all had same nostalgic moments & feelings; especially parting was very difficult – as everyone thought when we will meet again with such a fanfare.

No: 43 - Dhanbad Rly Station

ISM Student Volunteers:

Last but not the least, ISM students provided excellent and personalized support, with deep respect to seniors and family members consistent with typical ISM culture of love and bondage (they did not allow us even to carry our baggage to the cars, and insisted on doing it themselves) – were present at the Dhanbad Railway Station to receive participants on arrival, and arrange for their movement to the assigned accommodation, by cabs hired for a few days. The E D C (Executive Development Center ISM) which accommodated most participants, was manned almost round the clock by Student Volunteers to guide and assist; under overall control and coordination of our Dhanbad-based team of the Class of 1963.

I would fail in my duty, if I would not thank all the participants their spouses along with academic staff and students of ISM, all dignitaries who attended this G J, along with their valuable support to make this event more memorable.

Thus ended another occasion to re-live & re-kindle the nostalgic filled memories of our Alma mater - Indian School of Mines and we renewed our relationship once more with humble heart.

Here comes one great institutional name which still haunts every one minds, and we somehow would not like to lose its identity. Jai ISM and Jai Comrades.

Pratap K Mishra

Petroleum, 1963
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Memories of ISM Days: From writer desk:

How fondly it has etched every one heart’s. I have taken the opportunity to place some of the highlights – which I believe all will enjoy. Others may like to read from the souvenir. (Attached or send me email I will send you pdf copy).

I would like to add notes on how 1963 batch first occupants stayed in Tank Tin shed of WWII which was converted for the first time and used as a Hostel. I do not have photo of this hostel (may be if any of our mates around the globe, who have it, may scan and send to us, will be much appreciated).

I on the other hand - has found somewhat replica to make understand what that structure looked like – especially for younger generations and students who cannot imagine in farthest of their dreams. See photo below:

No: 44 – Replica of Tank Shop Hostel

This tin shed was called as LONG TOM HOSTEL – for Mining Graduates, diploma holders who used to work at Mosaboni Mines of Indian Copper Corporation era in 1950’s going to 1990’s. It used to accommodate in one shed like this around 60 to 80 trainees and they had three of such hostels. Good times – when ICC was in boom but was short of decent accommodation for Government scholarships / stipends holders – like our P G P T / P D PT allowance who were housed

Our ISM Tank Shop hostel converted to accommodate first year students of 1959 – 1963 batch, resembles like ICC – Long Tom, however Tank Shop Hostel was closed - when instead Lower and Upper Barracks was constructed (which writer has used as his first year hostel at Room No: 253 U B and many fond memories revolve around it, especially filling the floor with water in summer to get a feel of AC room, in scorching summer).

The Tank Shop Hostel at ISM has been very well described by Mr. P K Mishra and I quote his description below:

"The Tank Shop was a humongous twin tin-shed, which was a workshop used during World War II for repair of battle tanks. Each wing of the structure had a large rolling shutter at each end, for tanks to pass through. The sloping roof of each half must be 30 ft. high at the center. This tank shop was remodeled to accommodate and we were the first occupants of this unique hostel – where lot of naughty and funny memories lie for our batch mates.

Each shed was divided into rooms by 12 ft brick partition walls. There were nearly 48 rooms in two sheds, each accommodating three students. The rooms were topless (no roof or false ceiling) except the tin roof which was varying between 20 – 30 ft. In those days communication between rooms mate was by shouting or by knocking tin structure and there goes the bang, with audio amplified many times, and if couple of students do at same time – will result into musical nightmare for those who wanted to burn mid night oil for studies.

The toilet and bath blocks were outside this tin shed. The first rainfall choked the sewage system and it was a real mess. The hostel mess was located outside, so it was free from the problems.”

Few of our other attractions, where all have pass their times were Student Film Club as students used to watch with great fanfare 16 mm Hindi and occasional English movies at our auditorium (Now Christened as Penman Auditorium).

No: 45 - Penman Auditorium

Not to forget Railway Institute close to Dhanbad Railway station for English and Hindi Movies in yet another talkies behind Railway Station. Another pass time was at Ray Talkies in Dhanbad and two cinemas at Jharia ( Deshbandhu & Bihar AC Hall) where once for a while we used to go to enjoy Hindi movies along with Rajinder market where we would loaf around to have a breeze and meet our friends who had passed out. Walking distance was Hirapur where we will all go for a walk and enjoy some great sweets. Mani’ Dosa Shop next to ISM gate and Ganesh Chai shop outside Dhanbad railway station.

Arun Talwar

Mining, 1971

Note: All photos have been kept at my Picasa web album; if someone is interested to see all photos you will see first what has been used in keeping the blog flow followed by remaining I got from different sources. Click the link below, to enjoy whole lot. I would appreciate if they could be tagged with names and any note fitting to the life time thrill you all had at ISM.

https://picasaweb.google.com/115933331088209325388/GoldenJubilee1963BatchReunionFeb2ndTo4thFeb2013?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJCj07-a5oWhfg&feat=directlink

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Nostalgia by Photos – lest we may not forget, some time when we all rejoiced together at school, who knew we will see this day:

No. 46 - Dr D N Prasad with ISM Guest

No: 47 - Group Photo with Professors and our Director
D N Prasad
with ISM guests.

No: 48 - L to R: Acharya, Kehair, Gupta, Mathur and Sharma

No: 49 & 50 - Group Photos – enjoying Picnic

No: 51 and 52 All Outstanding Sports Men

No: 53 and 54 - We became
friends at school, and are friends forever!

No: 55 and 56 - We became friends
at school, and are friends forever!

No: 57 and 58 -Basant Celebration – Entertaining guests and friends with Quali at school campus!

No: 59 Dr Harsh K Gupta

Today, ISM alumni are spread over in all continents, except Antarctica where too our 1963 batch mate Harsh K Gupta had led the Indian Antarctica Expedition a few years back.

It’s a great feeling that Indian School of Mines graduates have conquered all the odds, which no institution around the globe can boast of. I wish people do understand, it takes years of hard work – for which reason our institute still shines against all odds.

Long Live Indian School of Mines and Long Live its Name-

Which is so much embedded to our hearts?

And

It’s a great pride for all of us who made it a HISTORY & now we will wait for incoming batch 1964 who will celebrate their Golden Jubilee in Feb’ 2014 for me to back with you. However, Golden Jubilee Blog for 1957 will be live soon as its
gone for moderation and tagging of names.

---------------------x--------The End-----------x------------

Golden Jubilee 1960 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2010(By David Pichamuthu- '60 Mining):

2012-07-07T17:24:00.001-07:00

ISM Main Building Glittering at Night

L to R: Mr T S Shrivastava, Mr. J K Parikh, Mr. S S Salodkar,

Mr L K Bose, Mr D V Pichamuthu, Mr S M Kolay,

Mr Ramakant Singh,Mr P N Tiwari, Mr R N Mishra,

Mr K K Agarwal, Mr U W Datey, Mr P K Dutta &

Mr R Y Kutumbe

Trip Down Memory Lane:

In the recent past, I had completed “Golden Jubilee celebrations for 1961 and 1962 batches in my blogs, which was read with great enthusiasm all around the globe, and still gets lot of hits, due to new blogs getting added, although at slow pace from my side due to my health concerns. Statistically as per Google, our blogs viewed so far has crossed a figure of more than 18,000 people who have viewed and read so far, which means in the last 15 months, when I first started blogging, it’s a great satisfaction to me as the writer. I hope I keep writing and this keeps my inspiration and motivation on-going. But, I would appreciate, if all could contribute to make our memories well recorded and remembered in the days to come, and send us lively discussion to keep me going.

My Golden Jubilee blogs for 1961 & 1962 batch can be read at:

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2011/03/golden-jubilee-1961-batch-reunion.html

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/golden-jubilee-1962-batch-reunion.html

I believed my blog for 1960 batch was equally important for me as I did justice for other two, as this will give us their story, how they eventually had there re-union.

My understanding as far as it goes is that the seeds for Golden Jubilee Celebrations were thought & placed by this batch way back in 2008-2010. They found very hard to connect and make data base for their Goldie’s, it’s still very interesting to know how they finally steered their way to have a get together not in the same pomp and show like 1961 & 1962 batches, but realistically they paved their way to meet, with that extra urge of love and affection for their batch mates, and I quote:

“Why not be together after 50 Years at the portals of ISM, where once we all parted”.

Keeping above in view, I thought very prudent to write my blog for 1960 batch also, so where to start was a big question mark. It was recently on 05^th June’ 2012, when I called on Mr Pallab Banerjee (’60 Mining), and later met him at his home on a social visit that I requested, if I could get photos (they speak more than thousand words on its own) and a report / write up for all of your activities of that re-union for me to write a blog.

We had a good chat at his home; he was pleased to later send me some photos and also sent mail request to his mates, that the wealth of information / conversation starting moving to and fro. In the meanwhile I started writing my new blog, when that information was in my hand, which inspired me to give it a go.

Initially I have to edit all the photos in jpeg format, as they were appearing more than one on a page in the souvenir. It took me quite some time, but hope they have come out well. Then, it took another couple of days, with many hours of struggle, to open yet another file of photos, due to formatting problem.

I would say, in short - 1960 batch, had its reunion in a most simple & humble manner, in which 22 Goldie’s joined at the portals of ISM.

They had lots of fun, played indoor sports like Table Tennis and other outdoor at ISM Basant Celebrations – 2010, and later enjoyed a sumptuous dinner. In their itinerary, they also visited Maithon Dam to revive some of school days memories to have picnic cum excursion to Maithon dam. It was another chitchatting trip all the way round and thanks goes to the then DGMS, S J Sibal (’71 Mining) now retired, who provided them the much needed transport from his pool.

I am told that Prof T Kumar, the then Director did made a charge for their stay at EDC Hostel even though was at discounted rates, and they (Goldie’s) took it with a smile.

But I strongly believe it should not have been charged as great courtesy & love & affection towards ex-mates, who were placing their footsteps at ISM portals after 50 years as a mark of respect. I note this with great apathy, and hope our current Director may note, as this trend as is not tuned with our age old traditions.

Further, most disheartening fact was that neither Director nor any staff members from the faculty came out from their shell’s; to meet & greet Goldie’s who were retracing their footsteps after 50 years.

Also Goldie’s were not invited to join Conclave delegates, which could have been done, even if it was at last minute or at a very short notice of knowing that they have all come for celebrating their Golden Jubilee from far and wide some even from overseas to retrace their steps where they spent their youth 50 years ago. I believe they did the right thing of refusing the dinner when all Conclave guests had left.

If I am honest, and write their feelings they were hurt is what makes me feel extremely sad. Personally I feel pathetic and disrespectful and hope this trend is stopped for ever.

Dhanbad Railway Station

I recall one incident, during our study tenure of ISM way back, when Prof (Dr) S N Sarkar took over as Acting Director – that he never came to see off Prof D N Prasad whom we were all giving final send off to his home town in Patna at Dhanbad Railway Station, (platform was decked & laid with flowers). All seniors, juniors and Mine Managers from the Industry with local Government officers from DGMS, Police all had come, but Prof S N Sarkar did not come to bid farewell, where we all wept as loving affectionate send off we were giving and all touched his feet one by one to take his blessings. I remember train departure was delayed by more than 2 hours; just that everyone could meet & take his blessings. It was a tearful send off. I have many memories of our Director how great his memory was; will write later in another blog. I recall there was such a huge protest, with representations to Ministries etc., that he was eventually removed from acting Directorship’s role.

Sometimes my sentiments expressed will pave the way for our age old traditions to be kept alive. Monies cannot always buy happiness, and if that was so, our age old rich traditions, would have not survived, more than 80 years of this institute in existence.

Look at this way, whenever our senior ex-students used to come & stay with us during their Second & First class examinations conducted by DGMS, we used to give them our rooms as part of age old traditions, and would stay whole day out to see, that they studied without any disturbance etc. Am I right? We used to leave our comforts, and would see, they studied at minimum disturbance. When they used to pass, they would come to college, and take us for a big gala party. Those who were outside Dhanbad will welcome us to take there next training in their mines or collieries so that they could pay back there love.

Hope all will join with me in praying for their happiness, cheerful days coupled with good health in the days to come & that are we are able to share their happiness, as most of them will be celebrating their 75^th Birthday Anniversaries this year unless already gone through by now. May God bless them with very long and many more happy innings to come?

To sum up, they did had a wonderful time, and will cherish these great moments, memories now it’s a history, with a final word they had to say, I quote:

“We did meet our friends even though our number was just 22 mates out of 61 Alumni of our batch, who made it to this occasion, meeting some after many decades, itself was self-contained pleasure & contentment which is very difficult to describe”

But were very sad when they parted whether God willingly they will have yet another opportunity to meet again.

My blog entitled "What I Left and what is now! Is worth reading to know where our school is from where we all left it (1960 going to 1970’s era’s, with photo gallery - may be few years thereafter also).

http://memories-indianschoolofminesdays.blogspot.co.nz/2012/04/ism-what-i-left-and-what-is-now.html

Golden Jubilee 1960 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2010 (By David Pichamuthu- '60 Mining):

Let me start by adding our historical group photo of 61 students, when we were all in our final year, how smartly we all posed for this shot, who knew we will see it again or will share with our mates after 50 years.

Mr David Pichamuthu

Mr David Pichamuthu wrote in his report for Goldie’s:

I quote:

“As I was sitting in my garden in Bengaluru (Now called Bangalore) on a day in autumn of 2008, with a cup of tea my thoughts drifted towards the days spent at Indian School of Mines & Applied Geology (ISMAG) as it was then called. I asked my wife Sundari to bring out the old photo albums. These are a veritable treasure trove - album of school days photos, and when I started beaming through, old memories starting flooding my mind; it took me back to my golden era - year of passing and how thereafter all these years have passed by as if it was yesterday. It suddenly struck me that 48 years have since passed since our batch had passed out of the hallowed portals of our Alma Mater and yet in another two years it would be our Golden Jubilee Year. I decided in my heart that it will be appropriate to celebrate this occasion and what better venue it will be than at ISM foregrounds only.

My heart started sinking with thoughts of yesteryears, some with happiness & some with sad, as few had left us to heavenly abode. I said to myself, Oh God, how I am going to contact my mates who are spread all around the globe & where to start, whom to ask etc. if we would like to have a Goldie’s get together. WE soon realized locating each person will be herculean task for one person, so I thought of a core team which was:

Lab Bose for Eastern Region.
S S Salodkar and U W Datey for Western Region.
Man Mohan Seam for Northern Region.

Year 2008:

After I bowled the first ball of locating our mates through the core group; the core group got cracking. I also started writing to my batch mates as I had neither their telephone nos. nor email ID’s. I was thrilled when responses started pouring in. So we kept on exchanging telephone number and I spoke personally. The core group handled the task collectively & efficiently, as we knew without each other help it would be just be impossible to track & trace our batch mates. Core team did fantastic job in locating some who had settled abroad, more specifically U.S.A, Canada, U.K and New Zealand as a part of the Great Indian Diaspora. This job required lot of patience and effort, which did yielded fruitful results. Time flew passed, and we found 2008 has come to close, but foundations laid to start and making jig jaw puzzle work in 2009.

Year 2009:

Then throughout 2009 we started working on leads; by exchanging tons of phone calls and to & fro of emails, as each lead, lead us to another and so on. Most of them responded, by saying:

“It’s a beautiful & brilliant idea, some even laughed, some said it’s too early” to “It’s an impractical idea”

But me and my team soldiered on & never got distracted by comments. So gradually things started to take shape as we were able to obtain postal addresses, telephone numbers and email ID’s of 35 of our batch mates, little more than 50%. Rest remained not reachable for any reason whatsoever. (Today let me share my love & affection with our mates that we are connected to 51 of our batch mates).

It was then decided it will be appropriate to have our get-together at ISM, to coincide with Basant Festivities of 2010, to make this event a final go & add to the glory of our Alma Mater how much that means to all of us.

The next problem was to tie-up the question of accommodation at Dhanbad during Basant 2010. The then Director of ISM, Prof. T. Kumar, agreed to extend all help by allotting rooms in the Executive Guest House at nominal rates. This was of course of huge assistance, although not as per ISM traditions to host ex-students with love and care, and at no charge.

Out of the 35 Goldie’s whom we could possibly contact, we were pleased & surprised that 22 Goldie’s did participated with some coming from overseas USA & New Zealand. To add colour to our proceedings around a dozen spouses also attended making us feel happy that we were with our lovely life partners.

LIST OF 22 GOLDIE’S WHO MADE HISTORY, PLACING THERE FOOTSTEPS AFTER 5 DECADES!

S. No	Names	Stream

1	Agarwal, K K & Mrs Agarwal	Mining
2	Banerjee, Dipankar & Mrs Banerjee	M
3	Banerjee, Pallab Kumar	M
4	Bose, Lab Kumar	M
5	Chatterjee, Subhas Chandra	M
6	Datey, U W & Mrs Datey	M
7	Dey, H K & Mrs Dey	M
8	Dutta , Piyush Kanti	M
9	Kolay, S M	M
10	Kutumbe, R Y & Mrs Kutumbe	M
11	Mishra, R N & Mrs Mishra	M
12	Parikh, J K & Mrs Parikh	AG
13	Pichamuthu, D V	M
14	Sachdeva, O P	M
15	Salodkar, S S	M
16	Sharma, Shyam	M
17	Singh, Mahendra Pratap	M
18	Singh Ramakant	M
19	Srivastava, T S	M
20	Suri, Tulsidas	M
21	Tiwari, P N	M
22	Seam, Manmohan	M
	GOLDIE’S WHO MADE IT	22 IN ALL

My Thanks to all my 1960 batch mates & others:

Words cannot express my personal gratitude to one and all, who all joined our bandwagon to be part of this historical occasion. I also know some have travelled from offshore with their life partners for all of us to smile with our partners and share nostalgia of school days together. It does make me feel proud to have you all here, and hope in the next few days will be full of fun and hope we will carry with us one of the finest memories back home.

Last but not the least - I shall be failing in my duty if I do not acknowledge my thanks to all the ladies, who made our trip more colorful and enjoyable. I must also thank all those who gave us leads, to nurture our get-together.

As a word of advice or suggestion for coming batches, who will celebrate their Golden Jubilee, to note: it’s never too late to start connecting with your mates, earlier you do, better you are, when time approaches as you all know time, never waits for any one? Also in this electronic era, it’s far easier and when more people are involved with computer technology.

I welcome you all for this Golden Jubilee celebrations of our batch”.

Hope we will try the best usage of time, since we are all now at ISM.

David Pichamuthu (’60 Mining)

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Where We All spent our Three days - 05^th Feb to 07^th Feb’ 2010

Goldie's all arrived on 05th Feb' 2010, although Mr David Pichamuthu arrived on 04th Feb' 2010, just to overlook the arrangements, and also I had anticipated problems and so I reached Dhanbad on the 4th itself by the Coalfield Express. To my utter disappointment, I found that there was no dinner in spite of earlier information being given to concerned authorities when booking was made and also the attendant reluctantly opened the room.

Luckily, Prof S P Banerjee who had traveled by the same train for the Conclave invited me to have dinner with him in the VIP guest house. The canteen is run by a contractor and as the others were to arrive the next day, I requested him to purchase few of our requirements

Anyway, these things would have been avoided if school administration who were organizing could have taken care of. And since our number was not too large, we were all accommodated at EDC Hostel cum Guest House.

06^th Feb’ 2010 we all traveled to Maithon Dam for a picnic cum excursion where we all spent whole day. After attending picnic Mr Pallab Banerjee (’60 Mining), left in the evening for Ranchi before Jharkhand Bandh (strike) which was to start on 07th Feb' 2012 so as not to miss his scheduled return flight to Auckland. Unfortunately for him this resulted in missing Basant Festivities of 07^th Feb’ 2012. We had gala good time and left for our home towns on 08^th Feb’ 2010.

Our Home Away from Home at ISM:

Executive Development Centre

L to R: Mr T S Shrivastava, Mr. J K Parikh, Mr. S S Salodkar,

Mr L K Bose, Mr D V Pichamuthu, Mr S M Kolay,

Mr Ramakant Singh,Mr P N Tiwari, Mr R N Mishra,

Mr K K Agarwal, Mr U W Datey, Mr P K Dutta, Mr R Y Kutumbe

Excursion cum Picnic at Maithon Dam:

DGMS Building Dhanbad

The Conclave - 05^th Feb’ 2010 & 06^th Feb’ 2010:

Just before the start of Basant Festivities of 2010, ISM Alumni were conducting a Conclave. This was being organized by then S J Sibal (’71 Mining), who was then DGMS and also the President of Alumni Association. All distinguished alumni like retired DGMS, Chairman of Coal India Subsidiaries, retired Directors of ISM were invited for two day event on the 05^th & 06^th Feb’ 2010. On the 05^th Feb’ 2010, they had high dinner which was hosted at DGMS bungalow; (Goldie’s were not invited).

On the 06^th Feb’ 2010: Goldie’s requested DGMS - S J Sibal (’71 Mining) to spare a comfortable transport to have an outing to Maithon Dam, which he agreed and no charge was laid on us. Two buses were given, one for the ladies accompanying the Conclave participants and one for the Goldie’s.

Maithon Dam View

We spent most of our day at Maithon – We had an enjoyable day at Maithon Club overlooking the far expanse of water. We enjoyed a sumptuous lunch and afterwards gathered on the lawn. First, we observed a minute's silence for our departed batch mates that we missed you all and have not forgotten you, and prayed for their soul rests in peace (25 at the last count) and then shared quality time together. Each one recounted how he happened to land up at ISM and shared his experiences. The ladies kept them busy in playing Housie (or Tombola).

After snacks and tea we left tired though very happy back, for the trip back to Dhanbad, where we were staying. It was time to leave for Dhanbad, after day long visit to Maithon, reminded our school days excursion trip to this nostalgic place, where we haven’t forgotten our friends who left us early.

In short - we had an enjoyable & most thrilling trip to Maithon Dam as lot of old memories of school days were revived among Goldie’s during chitchatting and the song which we sang together was coming to close.

06^th Feb’ 2010:

L to R: Mr L.K.Bose, Mr P.K.Dutta, Mr J.K.Parikh, Mr D.V.Pichamuthu,

Mr R.Y.Kutumbe, Mr U.W.Datey, Mr S.M.Kolay &

Mr S.S.Salodkar

Group Photo of Goldie's

Goldie's Group at Maithon Dam Club

Group photo with Mrs Kutumbe on extreme left

L to R: Mr P N Tiwari, Mr O P Sachdeva, Mr K K Agarwal,

Mr Ramakant Singh, Mr H K Dey, Mr L K Bose &

Mr P K Dutta

Relaxing at Maithon Club Gardens

Evening Sunset at Maithon

The evening shadow can be seen in the photo below shows how much we all enjoyed the whole day, relaxing, chit chatting etc. We had good food at this guest house. We kept on chatting until it became dark, and later in the evening left for Dhanbad, when the sun set took place.

Time to go back to Dhanbad, sun is setting Now

Wonderful Time we spent at Maithon,

great memories we leave behind

Later in the night on our return from Maithon at EDC we freshened up and then gathered in Mr David Pichamuthu’s room for drinks (thoughtfully brought by Mr Piyush Dutta) and the mood was light with a lot of jokes and leg-pulling. The ladies had their own "Conclave” as can be seen in some of the snaps. We all reassembled for dinner. (Since many of the Conclave delegates had left, the organisers came to invite us for dinner which we politely refused).

Relaxing at EDC Guest House

Chit Chatting at EDC Guest House

07^th Feb’ 2010: Basant Festivities of 2010:

In the Morning of 07^th: We woke up on 7th morning with joyous & youthful anticipation as we were to participate in the Basant festivities, some after a gap of full 50 years.

L to R: Mr L K Bose, Mr P K Dutta, Mr J K Parikh, Mr D V Pichamuthu,

Mr R Y Kutumbe, Mr U W Datey, Mr S M Kolay and

Mr S S Salodkar.

Goldie’s Group at Basant Feb’ 2010

07^th Feb’ 2010: On this Basant day ‘The President & Secretary of the Students Union’ came to EDC and escorted us to the Sports Complex (which was not there in our time). We were given caps with ISM insignia and the traditional oranges to quench our thirst. We then went to the hostel and played badminton and TT.

We could participate in all activities like sports especially few of our mates enjoyed hands on Table Tennis, at tennis and basketball (for those who don't know, I had captained the Bihar University Basketball Team) during the day.

By the way, Mr Lab Bose was the badminton champion and Mr Pallab Bannerjee, the TT champion in our final year for all those to refresh their memories as I am describing the events of the day.

Watching Table Tennis in Progress

TT: Mrs Kutumbe (blue Sari) playing her ball to opponent

Mrs Kutumbe (blue Sari) to serve

Goldie's also played their shots at TT table

Watching TT in Progress with a smile

In the Afternoon of 7^th: We went around the Mela organised by the students in the lower playground and at 4 p.m. gathered in the Golden Jubilee hall for the Alumni Association meeting.

In the Evening of 7^th: Later that night Goldie’s after the customary round of drinks, had a sumptuous dinner to their fill and finally all rested that night, possibly with few drinks, jokes, and bid farewell to all Goldie’s – and they left for their homes, as all had their return flights/trains booking confirmed for 08^th Feb ‘2010. They also carried with them the sweet melodies of nostalgic school days, tracing their footsteps – after a span of 50 years. There was a tinge of sadness on every one face - as we were not sure if we would meet again. It was a pleasant departure as far as melodies are concerned, but sad ness if at all we could meet again, as we are no longer to be young and slowly but surely is aging, that we left for our home towns.

Lesson for future G J Celebrations: I believe a good preparation; will lead to more enjoyable experience for incoming batches. We can all learn through what Mr J P Goekna (61 Mining) and Mr Suresh Mehta (’62 Mining), steered there way, with tons of meetings, get together prior to the day to make this dream come true for a wonderful re-union.

From blogger desk, all those who are outside our network or connection it’s high time, we get together help each other to get our data base well organized. I am trying hard, but with your help only I can achieve, what I call as “GLOBAL ISM ALUMNI DIRECTORY”. Time will speak on its own, whether what I wrote was TRUE!

I pen down here and will look forward for next batch, which celebrates next Feb’ 2013.

Arun Talwar (’71 Mining)

July’ 2012

===================+++++++++++++++++++++++=================

Nostalgia by Photos - Golden Jubilee 1961 Batch

2012-06-10T20:52:00.004-07:00

Main Building decked as Queen

Last year I wrote, a report sent my Mr J P Goekna ('61 Mining), and since then we have in hand all the photos, which were taken by no less than his own son-in-law Vikas Jain, that I have privilege to share with every one, who would like to see for them selves, and let us know who all are in photos.

For convenience I have added caption as serial nos, from 1 to 85 and so on for more photos, when I add etc. I know a year has since elapsed, lets see how memories of our seniors or others who attended that evening last Feb' 2011 can help me!

Group Photo - Who all made it to this historic G J Celebrations


04


06


07


12

Hopefully all will enjoy, there memories of there meeting at ISM Feb' 2011. I believe by now many must have celebrated there 75th Birthday Anniversary with there family & friends, please shoot us your email with an update, so that we keep sharing your joys with fellow mates.

Its not very easy job, to be in communication with fellow mates with whom we all parted 50 years ago. But hard work done by 1960 batch, was starting point, and that its fruits are being enjoyed by coming batches, from where to start or what all need to be done, to get your data base ready etc. for your mates who are scattered all around the globe to make this event as nostalgic as we can all accomplish. Its never too late, and still many are not computer novice.

I wonder when 1963 batch, goes for there Goldie's meet next year (Feb' 2013), how many will be able to do so, as time is very short, only thing in there favor is electronic media which to some extent can help, and few of us who, are in communication with alumni for past 1.5 years or so, when I started connecting our college mates for Global ISM Directory, that we have sent email Id's all those who are connected with us. Its been road with lots of ups & downs, but I am still there to see we all are connected and rejoice some of your moments, which will mark HISTORY.

I am working on my next blog Golden Jubilee Celebrations for 1960 batch, although late, but was awaiting write ups / souvenir reports, that they are now in hand that hopefully will be live in next couple of weeks, with best wishes from you and all those who are helping me in this en-devour.

God bless every one, we wish every one to have healthy and pleasant life ahead, in the midst of your grandchildren, who I believe are lot of joy, when they talk or visit your/our homes.

Cheers, until we meet next,

Arun Talwar ('71 Mining)

11th June' 2012

Basant Festivities at ISM & More!

2012-06-03T22:03:00.000-07:00

Main Building majestically decorated with sparkling Lights

Trip Down Memory Lane:

http://indianschoolofmines.blogspot.co.nz/2012/05/golden-jubilee-1962-batch-reunion.html

This blog is in continuation to my earlier blog on Golden Jubilee Celebrations for '62 batch. I recall, during our times, we used to wait for Basant Time, which used to fall in the first week end of the February month, and that practice is still on, what we may call as tradition of hosting this function, and coupling with annual feature of G J Celebrations. I also recall how we used to visit seniors an alumnus’s settled near by Dhanbad area to collect monies to arrange this function, while we were students.

I wonder what is the way, such a great pomp show continues till date, possibly still same or school has included into its budget now? But whatever way it’s been the tradition remains long lived – it’s fabulous and comments received from Goldie’s who have expressed in their own words, marvelous, wonderful experience, great food, overall we all rejoiced and met some of our mates after many decades with nostalgia of school days still afresh in our hearts, showing their family there hostel rooms etc.

This blog, I am trying to cover some of the festivities, like outdoor and indoor games played at school play grounds etc. along with Basant get together at different metros:

Some of the photos below, one can see how enthusiastically our ladies & Goldie’s from 1962 batch participated including walking around school roads where once we have walked ages ago. Current Students have been a source of encouragement both in giving our ladies a company as if to let them know where their hubbies once placed their footsteps 50 years ago & how school has progressed today.

Ladies on walking spree around ISM Campus

Group Photo with Current Students

Kite flying with students watching

Mrs Sheela Singh & Mrs K Sachdev in Action

But most importantly few of our Alumni’s were given distinguished Alumni Awards & Basant Samman to make 2012 FESTIVITIES most memorable.

Distinguished Alumni Awards:

1. S J Sibal ('71 Mining) - Ex- DGMS.

2. N M Bora (' 74 ISM) - CMD Oil India Ltd.

Basant Samman:

1. Prof S P Ahuja ( '61 Mining).

2. Prof Raja V. Ramani ('62 Mining).

3. Late Prof B K Kejriwal (‘62 Mining) – Mrs Kejriwal received the award.

4. Mr A R Chetal ('?? Mining).

5. Mr N C Jha (‘74 Mining) - Ex- CIL Chairman.

Distinguished Alumni Awards:

S J Sibal ('71 Mining) receiving DA Award

N M Bora ('74 Pet.Eng.) - CMD receiving DA Award

Basant Samman:

Prof S P Ahuja receiving Basant Samman

Prof Raja V Ramani receiving Basant Samman

Late Prof B K Kejriwal ‘(62 Mining) - Mrs B K Kejriwal received award

01 - Please tag name

02 - Prof M Jawed receiving award

03 - Please tag name

Mrs & Mr Suresh Mehta, I believe over stayed at ISM after Basant Function, below is a group photo with students on 12 Feb’ 2012.

Group Photo of Mrs & Mr Mehta with Students

I have also got few photographs from different metro’s or so called different chapters, like Delhi, Calcutta, Bombay Hyderabad, Goa etc. and they make this event rosy in their home towns where they are all settled etc.

Delhi Chapter Get Together 06 Nov' 2011

04 -1960 Batch Get together at Calcutta on 12 Feb’ 2012

L to R: Mr Dipakar Banerjee, G S Mukerjee, Ramakant Singh, Chitranjan Dass,

Dr P K Dutta, Biren Banerjee ('47 Mining), L K Bose, J K Dewan,

J K Parikh, S S Salodkar, Dr S M Kolay, U W Datey , D V Pichamuthu, Mr ?????

05 - 1971 Batch Get together at Calcutta on 12 Feb’ 2012

We are sitting in Asia–Pacific, with very few & still rejoice all the year round whenever we have opportunity between two of our families settled here in Auckland, but more so whenever we get Alumni’s who come here for holiday or otherwise whose children have settled here, that we make the get together with love & affection at our homes & picnic’s outdoors. So for us, we welcome every one, and will make Basant Festivity whenever you plan a holiday here.

Some of those, I have shared with you all here:

Mrs. & Mr. R P Prashara (’58 Mining), (Chandigarh, India), visited us few years ago.
Mrs. & Mr. R Y Kutumbe ('60 Mining), (Nagpur, India) / Mrs and Mr Piyush Dutta ('60 Mining), (Florida, USA) - 06th Feb' 2011.
Prof J R Kayal & Mrs Kayal ('69 Applied Geophy) , Calcutta, India)- 20th July' 2011.
Mrs. & Mr. Ajay Rohatgi ('68 Pet. Engg), (USA)- 30th July' 2011.
Mrs. & Mr J B Singh ('62 P.Tech), (USA) - 15 Sept' 2011.

Mrs & Mr R P Prashara ('58 Mining)

L to R: Mr R Y Kutumbe, A Talwar, Mr P Banerjee &
Mr P K Dutta

L to R: A Talwar, Mr R Y Kutumbe & Mr P Banerjee

Picnic at Mission Bay with Mrs and Mr R Y Kutumbe

L to R; A Talwar, Prof J R Kayal & Mr P Banerjee

Picnic at Duck Park with Prof J R Kayal and A Talwar family

L to R: A Talwar with Mr & Mrs Ajoy Rohatgi

L to R: Talwar, Mr J B Singh & Mr P Banerjee,

Mr Banerjee daughter Mala,

Mrs Talwar, Mrs Banerjee and Mrs J B Singh

My Thoughts on Name Change:

Today, our school has attained new heights, added additional new infrastructure added so many new streams of studies but ISM glory will move on, time will tell whether we are correct in our feelings. As far I know, Ministry has not agreed to name change, which does gives me hope that Government also have same ideas after seeing what name change damage it took place for other places of learning in country and how they have reverted it to its OLD Glory, few years later.

But sometimes it makes me really sad, when I hear or read news from current students that they are looking for a change of its name and tie there affiliation with IIT's etc - and want to leave legacy of ISM behind, we as oldies can hardly swallow. I do get mixed reactions and we can differ in our opinion, but time will speak on its own.

I wonder why this esteem institute cannot retain its legacy, just like Royal School of Mines, which now falls under 'Imperial College of Science of Technology' but retains original glory. I would say we could possibly design our name and still keep our identity which is known throughout the world as ISM name is on all big Universities who now want to offer PG studies in their countries & offer now even scholarships for internships, a term never heard in our times. Isn’t it the good work done, by alumni who take painstakingly efforts to see where we are today? Possibly one name does come to my mind is “Indian College / School of Science and Technology" and all wings fall below, like:

Indian School of Mines,

Indian School of Petroleum Engineering,
Indian School of Applied Geology,
Indian School of Applied Geophysics,
Indian School of Mining Machinery,
Indian School of Mechanical Engineering etc.
Indian School of Computer Sciences & so on..

Anyway, that time will tell–this way, I believe our name will still remain & will shine for ever.

Now all the festivities are over for me to report for 2011 & 2012, time has come to await for next gala function, may be 75^th birthday, Golden Wedding Anniversaries or possibly sharing news about your children achieving distinction or have brought new glory to our mother country etc. So if you like share with us, please do so, we will keep our momentum on going.

Hot News of the Month:

Shouryya Ray from Dresden, Germany, from Calcutta cracks 350Yrs old math puzzle.I hope all must have read or come across great news about, one of our Indian-origin student at the age of 16 yrs, has cracked 350 years old math puzzles, who knows who will be next for some great news:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/nri/other-news/Indian-origin-student-cracks-350-years-old-math-puzzles/articleshow/13542279.cms

My Childhood Memories:

I wonder this wonderful & memorable experience will come and go, as rightly said by a poet in a poem which I remember of my schooling days, way back from early sixties, while I was student at Delhi Public School, Mathura Road, New Delhi and I quote:

“One may come and one may go, but I will go on for ever”,

The poet has rightly said while standing close to the banks of flowing river, as river flow never stops as long as its course is not stopped by man. I wish I could remember whole poem but second line goes like this, and I quote:

“While I flow for ever, My ripples shine while water flows its course like a silver screen, and fruit on trees shines with early day water mist - like silver fruit upon silver tree”.

I believe and hope all our friends enjoy my blog as I enjoy keeping you all connected, with my thoughts as they come to me. Some who could not make it for any reason what so ever to this celebrations like me, my story will still update your missing nostalgia. So relax, enjoy and share your thoughts as they come to you, by placing comments at the bottom of my blog or by writing few words, which go long way to keep my inspiration ON.

Basant of Feb' 2013:

Lastly now ball is in the courts of 1963 batch, and we wish them all the success and that they keep the momentum on–going, keeping in mind, time will not wait for any one, it will just fly out, and we will see them at next “Basant of Feb’ 2013”.

Let us hope, that we get connected to all who would love to share there happiness & sorrow, and keep sending us emails, by adding few more names from your contact list. Every time you all respond, as you never know, we may have been looking for same person or our friends wanted to be in touch with there old pals – so that we could reach one and all. I always update, my directory as and when I get mails from my mates. My heart is open, if you want to call me day or night or leave a message with your contact details, I will respond you when am back home.

I will pen down here, till new thoughts allow me to back with you.

Arun Talwar (’71 Mining)

31st May’ 2012

Golden Jubilee 1962 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2012 (By Suresh Mehta - '62 Mining)

2012-05-30T08:00:00.000-07:00

Our ISM Main Building We all Adore

L to R: Front Row – J B Singh, A.N.Bose, P. Bose, K.P.Singh, U.P.Tripathi, C.S.Kapoor, M.N.Sharma, R.V.Ramani, A.Piplapure, T.R.Sadana, P.N.Verma, S.Rajan,
D.K.Ghosh, A.N.Sinha

L to R: Second Row - K.Banerjee, R.S.Solanki, S.M.Shetty, S.Prakash, K.C.Choudhary, S.P.Khullar, N.N.Gautam, G.P.Ghatak, R.K.Shrivastva, A.N.Indurkar, M.S.Gulati,
G.N.Mishra, P.K.Shrivastva

L to R: Third Row - S.Khera, J.C.Rastogi, M.R.Thapar, C.Narain, S.C.Mehta, P.Talwani,

K.B.Trehan, B.P.Singh, M.P.Singh, R.C.Singh, A.N.Goomar, R.P.Singh,

R.L.Didee, B.P.Pandey

L to R: R.C.Singh, Suresh Mehta, Shashi Prakash, C.Narain,
R.V.Ramani, R.K.Shrivastva, G.P.Ghatak, A.N.Sinha,
S.Rajan & N.N.Gautam

L to R: R.C.Singh, S.Mehta, C.Narain, S.Prakash & G.P.Ghatak

Group Photo with Students

Trip Down Memory Lane:

I had not been keeping good health, and that resulted in not having good mood, and willingness to write the blogs, more so updating few events which have passed through few months ago, but did try to connect with my friends as far I could chew. It was recently, when I called Mr. Suresh Mehta (’62 Mining), wherein we talked on various subjects, one such was there ‘Trip Down Memory Lane’ as I had been looking for all 69 participants, group photo. I was mentioning to him, that his web site (http://ism62.com/), entitled Golden Jubilee Reunion. I did not find, but today while writing and going through web site once again, was surprised that site has added more from 100 initially to around 600 photos now.

One great event was to report “Golden Jubilee celebrations (from 04th Feb' 2012 to 06th Feb' 2012) for 1962 passing out batch who had clocked there 50 years after passing out of the institute”. Most of them are retired & all should be in 70 – 75 age groups, but interestingly are very active & most organized group as rightly commented by Mr. Pradip Gangopadhyay (’70 Pet.Engg). Hope all will join with me that we all pray for their happy, cheerful days coupled with good health in the days to come.

I can vouch and say wow - what a great achievement & fulfillment which will go for enormous efforts put in by two stalwarts Mr. Suresh Mehta & Mr. Nitayyand Gautam who spent tired less days as if they were in youth by burning sometimes mid night oil, followed by months of preparations, host of meetings, finally going out of their family comfort zone to make this event a most memorable event which will go down in the annals of ISM History - 'Basant Function of 2012', am I right?

One great remark, which I read in newspaper media and from various emails and my own guts feeling was, and I quote:

“We all enjoyed to our thrill with our family & friends, colleagues from Mining industry, current staff & students at ISM with a lot of nostalgia of 50 years, since we graduated from our great institute ISM" – It was a Trip Down Memory Lane, and we will all cherish this great memories, that we did meet our friends (with whom we once parted), some after many decades.

Some may like to read my blog entitled "What I Left and What is Now! school has made tremendous progress. http://memories-indianschoolofminesdays.blogspot.co.nz/2012/04/ism-what-i-left-and-what-is-now.html

Isn’t that zeal, love & affection for each fellow mate and the bondage of our school days, is one and the only one, I believe is in existence in the whole world. I have tested number of times, since I have traveled quite a lot, and have come number of instances, wherein others have always envied our age old TRADITION.

ISM 1962 Batch Reunion – A Report - By Mr. Suresh Mehta & Mr. Nittayand Gautam - Feb' 2012

Mr Suresh Mehta in discussion with Mr N N Gautam

Mr Suresh Mehta gave welcome address to jam packed audience, and spoke with great feeling of contentment & accomplishment for the efforts put in over past 5 years to be where we are today.

I quote:

“Today, I am here on the campus of ISM - Dhanbad after 50 years of graduation - that this great moment has come which also embarks history, as I welcome you all today morning. This great moment has come with every one help & devotion to rejoice, after our tirelessly efforts put in over past 5 years, which have paid the rich dividends to be here together among you all.

The first time was when we all met in Feb’ 2008, to celebrate Basant Function at Surajkund, followed by at Manesar in Feb’ 2010 wherein we revived our memories down the lane of school days, (where we all spent time together, not to know where our destinies will take us). Today we are all retired; enjoying blissful life in the midst of our grandchildren that it was here in one of the meetings cum get tog ether’s it was also thought appropriate to connect our friends / classmates around the globe (since so many are settled abroad). I can say with conviction its due to today’s electronic world which made it easier to connect, although few were not novice with computer’s age. We got help & encouragement from our near & dear ones and our classmates, seniors & juniors to make this event a great success.

Our school has changed quite a lot from what we left, to what is now. And forgive me here to add that - in the process has lost its uniqueness. We had only 4 disciplines & 150 students intake in our batch which has been same for next one to two decades, that today we have moved forward, but hope our bondage in the days to come does not get diluted, when strength goes up.

Today we have intake of about 800 students (boys and girls) in various disciples which has increased more than 5 fold intake compared to our times, with more than a dozen different disciplines.

Joy & Sorrow:

In our efforts to get connected with you all - Our heart goes for few of our mates, who left us early to heavenly abode, they are; Late - Naresh Kapoor, Anand Atal, B.K. Kejriwal, S.K. Ambasta, B.S. Rank and K.C. Patni and some other friends whom destiny had snatched away earlier but will always remain in our memories.
We also tried to contact the spouses / children of all of them, whom destiny snatched away from us earlier and some did responded and we have brought out their memories in this souvenir now being made available to you in “Lest We Forget”, hope you will all cherish keeping this as your souvenir.

Thanks on behalf of all 1962 batch mates:

Words cannot express my personal gratitude to one and all, who had made it to be part of this memorable occasion, I know some have traveled from offshore with their life partners for all of us to smile with our partners and share nostalgia together. It does make me feel proud to have you all here, and hope in the next few days will be full of fun and play.

Please join with me to give a big hand and our salutation to Mrs Pushpa Lata Kejriwal, Mrs Gautmi Munjal, and Mrs Krishna Chakarabraty for joining us here and also to Mrs Neena Sawhney for always being a part of this group but who could not make it today for reasons beyond her control.

Last but not the least - I shall be failing in my duty if I do not acknowledge my thanks to:

1. Mr Satish Grover for generating funds,

2. Mr Rajinder Solanki for editing the souvenir,

3. Mr H.N. Karmakar for local support and our convene,

4. Mr N.N. Gautam without whom this event would not have been possible,

5. My wife Pramilla, who always cheered me, with a smile,

6. Delhi Chapter Group of Members & their spouses.

I welcome you all for this Golden Jubilee celebrations of our batch”.

SURESH MEHTA (’62 Mining)

====================================

Mr N.N.Gautam wrote:

It was our most memorable reunion of our 1962 batch, wherein 69 alumni along with their beautiful wives joined us to celebrate this day. The list is given below:


	List of ISM 1962 Batch who attended the Golden Jubilee & Basant 2012

1	Kalyan Banerjee	24	A.K.Mukherjee	47	R.C. Singh
2	A.N.Bose	25	R.S.Nagi	48	R.P. Singh
3	Pratik Bose	26	C.Narain	49	S.B.Singh
4	K. C. Choudhury	27	B.P.Pandey	50	Rajendra. S. Solanki
5	Suresh. C. Chugh	28	Arun.R.Piplapure	51	Prakash.K. Shrivastava
6	R.L Deedi	29	Shashi Prakash	52	Rup. K. Srivastava
7	Avinash. C. Dubey	30	J.K.Prasad	53	Pradip Talwani
8	Nitya. N. Gautam	31	T.Prasad	54	S.N. Tatwawadi
9	G.P.Ghatak	32	Kamal.K.Pujari	55	M.R.Thapar
10	D.K. Ghosh	33	S.R.Rajan	56	B.N. Tiwari
11	Amar.N.Goomar	34	J.C. Rastogi	57	Ashok. K. Tooley
12	Satish.K.Grover	35	Raj.K. Sachdeva	58	K. B. Trehan
13	Mohinder.S.Gulati	36	Tilak.R. Sadana	59	U.P. Tripathi
14	Ashok.N.Indurkar	37	S.K. Sarkar	60	Murari Trivedi
15	C.S.Kapoor	38	Virendar.K. Sehgal	61	Sudhir. K.Varma
16	H.N.Karmakar	39	M.N. Sharma	62	R. Venkataramani
17	Subash. C. Khera	40	Suresh.M. Shetty	63	Premanand Verma
18	S.P. Khullar	41	B.P. Singh	64	Subash. C. Verma
19	G.S.Khuntia	42	C.P. Singh	65	Kailash.C.Vijh
20	Kumar. H.Limsay	43	J.B. Singh	66	S.Y Wakhare
21	S.R.Mamidwar	44	K.P.Singh	67	S.D.N. Sinha
22	Suresh Mehta	45	M.P. Singh	68	G.Rai
23	G.N.Misra	46	P.G Singh	69	B.M.Shingari

Home Away from Home, at ISM & Around:

A total of 69 classmates made to this event, 29 of us stayed at the EDC Hostel at ISM, 20 at Sky Lark Hotel and remaining stayed with their relatives / friends. The only local resident H.N.Karmakar could not attend due to his wife's illness.

On 4th Feb’ 2012:

We assembled at 11.00 am had drinks at Nehru Complex - BCCL, followed by lunch and evening tea. Later in the evening we all attended the IMC Cultural Programme & Dinner hosted by BCCL where we were served drinks at an exclusive enclosure specially made for us. The venue for, 4^th Indian Mineral Congress & Exhibition was at BCCL Auditorium.

L to R: U.P Tripathi, T.R Sadana, M.S Gulati, J.B.Singh, R.S.Solanki, B.P.Pandey,

S.P.Khullar, M.N.Sharma, N.N.Gautam, R.V.Ramani,

A.K.Tooley, S.R.Rajan, S.K.Grover, P.N.Verma,

M.R.Thapar (behind Verma), C.Narain,

P.K.Shrivastva, B.P.Singh and A.N.Sinha

L to R: Mrs Susan Narain & Mrs Pramila Mehta

5th. Feb’ 2012 -
We have been fully occupied as you can see our schedule below:

Morning: We spent most of our morning at school play grounds with Outdoor & Indoor Activities:

Kite Flying: Mr M R Thapar ('62 Appl. Geophy.)

Badminton: Mr S K verma ('62 Mining) & Mrs Neeru Ahuja

Mr Abhinash Dubey ('62 Mining) & Mrs Geeta Tooley


Mrs Sheela Singh & Mrs Kusum Sachdev in Action

We enjoyed flying kites & played in door & out door games with our mates along with chitchatting with current students. I believe we did sweat, and did get tired quickly, but we wanted to participate and have fun.
The playground was belted with lot of Bollywood hits for others who were witnessing play.
I wonder what numbers were those songs, but if I have to place it, have to be of that era. I have added few hit songs of 1962!
We all love music, gives us a great solace, so while you are reading, click & plug your ears with lovely music of yesteryear's and enjoy reading my blog? You will really need patience, if you wanted to enjoy as I have enjoyed in writing my blog for past couple of weeks.
“Kahin Deep Jale - Bees Saal Baad” [1962] - http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=9igDD2G9nbk
"Main Pyar Ka Rahi Hoon" [1962] - http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=3O1EyoQ6cqk
“Tera Mera Pyar Amar - Asli Naqli” [1962] - http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=NAh_0Mv09tA

Lunch: Later in the afternoon we were served with a delicious & sumptuous lunch, students did took care to serve us. After lunch we attended ISMAA - AGM and Mr T.K Lahiri, CMD - BCCL was re-elected and ladies enjoyed fete.

Evening: A total of seven Alumni were honored – 2 for Distinguished Alumni Awards and 5 for Basant Samman and their photos will be placed, yet in another blog soon.

Late Evening Cultural Programme:

We had to our thrill – a grand musical & cultural program me which was put up by the students. It was simply fantastic. Later we were served with lavish dinner to our fill.

Cultural Programme - WOW

Nehru Complex – BCCL: We were given a resounding welcome by ISM students, ISMAA and BCCL. We had two halls booked at Nehru Complex - BCCL, where we spent time after breakfast for the whole of 4th and 6th Feb’ 2012 to rejoice chats, recapturing our youth days with fun & laughter.

6th. Feb’ 2012 - Our schedule below of the day as follows:

Morning: Our batch met at Nehru Complex BCCL at 10.30 AM for a get together with snacks & drinks (Hard Drinks on request were served by SKY Lark Hotel, BYO we had was Red wine) followed by lunch. (All arrangements or food and decorations at Nehru complex, BCCL were done by Raju Caterer, who I am told is the best in Dhanbad).

Afternoon: Our batch hosted, a thanks giving party "High Tea" to the ISM faculty, ISMAA Office Bearers, BCCL officials and all Ex-students who attended Basant festivities all these days.

Mementos:

We gave mementos on behalf of our batch as a token of our love, with thanks & appreciation to following officers who made it convenient to be part of us, and spared time out of there busy schedule. The list included - Director ISM, teaching faculty of ISM, DC – Dhanbad and all other dignitaries who attended as follows:

Mr. Suresh Mehta to Prof D C Panigrahi (’84 Mining) - Director ISM

Mr. Kulbhushan Trehan to Mr. T K Lahri - CMD BCCL

Mr. M.R.Thapar to Prof Javed Ahmed

Mr.A.N.Goomar to P.S.Mishra

Mr. Subash Khera to Biswajeet Paul

Mr A.R.Piplapure to B.S.Paul

Mr. N N Gautam to Prof S P Banerjee (’57 Mining)

Mr. N N Gautam to Prof Sharma

Mr. N.N.Gautam to Prof S B Shrivastava (HOD Mining)

Dinner in Progress

We parted with heavy hearts, as song which we sung all together for past few days, its melodies remained, and we all left for our home towns; few left for Calcutta others to New Delhi, few possibly to connect to international flights to USA.

How these three days we spent, just cannot describe, the kind of fulfillment but we all enjoyed to our fill, a fantastic reunion with full fanfare with young and we oldies. We will always cherish, and as the sun sets & dust settles down we carry with us great satisfaction as long hard work of past 5 years has been accomplished. I wish and hope future batches, make this event more memorable.

N.N.Gautam (‘62 Mining)

===================================================

My blog will not be complete, if I do not add a befitting POEM, written by Mr Chandramani Narain (’62 Mining) in his poetic words & is the testimony of how much enthusiasm 1962 batch had to make this event a great success. For more poems, you are recommended, to read more (13 in all) on web site - (http://ism62.com/).

Celebrating Golden Jubilee of Graduation 1962 ISMAG Batch:

IT was the summer of 58, Which sealed my fate
Mining, Metallurgy and Medical pr-entry exams in succession

My father’s options for my career choices
With IIT Kharagpur rejected, Patna Medical De-selected

ISMAG 1411 registration was elected Bag and baggage

this budding Mining Engineer landed at ISM

Checked into Barracks with Bihar Mess Room service provided
New friends, Suresh, MN, IP, Munshi & Ambasta, and many, many more
For lasting comradeship evermore

The red building became our seat of learning

Prof D N Prasad and Bamboo Bhattacharya’s yearning
To mold us into top level engineers

For India’s future and our own well-being
Education and Practical Training was all well-meaning.

Mani’s Dosas and Railway Institute Cinema were welcome relief
Evening stroll into Jagjiwan Nagar to let off steam
Cricket, Badminton and Table tennis, we played

Then four years passed off quickly
BSc with Honours and AISM Diploma achieved distinctly

Year 2012, here we assemble at ISM - Dhanbad with determination & vigor

To celebrate 50 years of our graduation

Re-live our memories and Re-charge our Batteries

Also, in the Memory of our friends who departed so early

And let me offer a Toast for the coming years to all >

“Health and Happiness to all friends and families of the 1962 ISMAG batch”

Last but not the least - There is saying, what men do, there better half’s contribute to their success, and I will add how enthusiastically our ladies contributed in making a wonderful celebrations and see how great smiles are on their faces in their group photo.

L to R: Front Row - Mrs Pramila Mehta, Mrs Geetha Ramani, Mrs Lata Verma,
Mrs Kapoor, Mrs Indu Sadana, Mrs Vibha Indurkar, Mrs Mishra

L to R: Second Row – Mrs Ava Thapar, Mrs Susan Narain, Mrs Abha Goomar,
Mrs Puspalat Singh, Mrs Neelima Singh, Mrs Krishna Chakarbarty,
Mrs Sheela Singh,

L to R: Third Row Mrs Lakshmi Rajan, Mrs * , Mrs * ,
Mrs Meera Prakash, Mrs Aneeta Talwani, Mrs Meera Gautam,
Mrs Pratima Singh, Mrs Sakuntala Choudhary, Mrs Mira Bose,
Mrs Tamalika Banerjee, Mrs Ranjana Bose

My Old Memories with 1962 Alumni:

L to R: Prof R V Ramani & A Talwar

It reminded me, after seeing photos of Golden Jubilee, that I have with me photos, of Prof. Raja V Ramani one of his London friend (I cannot recall if he was also from ISM) whom I met along with Prof B K Kejriwal in London in the year 1983 / 84, where we did spend two days, one of which was to see evening show at Piccadilly Circus, West End, London hosted by Prof Ramani. I have very fond memories of that evening which we spent together, along with three of my friends in London.

Luckily, last year while I was looking for some photos, back home in New Delhi for my 'My Memoirs' that I brought with me these photos of my London Trip way back in 1983/84. I also recall – my recent emails to Prof R V Ramani – wherein I mentioned him, of our meeting in 1983/84.

L to R: Prof Ramani's friend, Prof. R V Ramani & Prof B K Kejriwal

I believe in this photo, they all were together to do shopping for themselves and for there family. His friend is paying at the departmental store counter.

Hope after seeing these two photos, Bhabhi & his children will rejoice and see how much we have changed from young days grace to now, unfortunately we do not have with us Prof B K Kejriwal, but I will try to send it to Mrs B K Kejriwal and to let her know - how fondly we loved him. That’s the same testimony – been expressed in souvenir on this occasion.

During my London stay of one year, I met along with above, Late Prof G S Marwah, Prof A K Ghosh. And few others were my colleagues from Mosaboni Mines - HCL / ICC who had sponsored my trip to IC / RSM, London. Time flashes to so fast, as if I was in London.

Late Prof G S Marwah (ex- Director ISM):

Our school has attained new heights, and one name always come to my mind is Late Prof G S Marwah whose vision was to take our school right on top. I believe his contributions have left a dent mark on school – he added new infrastructure and added various new disciplines, new areas to pool in monies, by helping mining industry with mining consultancy in various disciplines, to what school is today. More so, was very happy to meet ex-students, who would come, meet, greet & needed any help what so ever. I am one of those, who had great privilege to have interaction with him, both at school, overseas and also in my home town.

Arun Talwar & Dr. Hira Lal Patel

My Association:

Last year on 02^nd Dec’ 2011 just one day before my departure to New Zealand - I also happen to attend, Alumni Get together for Imperial College (Royal school of Mines), London – to which also I belong, and how do they promote, there college with lot of videos / documentary and what Institute is doing to gather more cream students, from around the globe & to attract financial help- which later help deserving new students with scholarships etc.

A Point to Ponder By ISM:

I believe this can be looked into, and possibly added as one of the events to attract industries around our home country & from abroad – to promote our ISM image around the globe. I believe our ex-students will like to contribute, if it goes for the right cause of helping deserving students, as it happened recently when two students from Petroleum Engineering went to USA & needed financial help.

Why not we enrich our school and that’s so our own brothers & sisters with latest facilities, so that we can say with pride, we are best and offer best, invite Professors, Scholars from around the globe, to impart lectures, get suggestions to improve ISM facilities & faculty to the highest standards. Am I right?

We cannot be sitting on laurels, we have to keep on thinking miles ahead how to uplift our ISM, well that is my dream & I keep on thinking same. Hope my few words, will tinkle heart of our well to do seniors & Indian Mining Industry as a whole, which are looking for new ideas where to invest.

My thanks & acknowledgement goes to all my seniors & my mates, who have inspired me, to what little I am blogging today. My personal thanks go to Mr. Suresh Mehta & Mr. N N Gautam whom I met at Get Together Cum AGM - ISMAA Delhi Chapter on 06^th Nov’ 2011 & the relationship since has grown four fold.Today I have been able to complete my blog, with great thrill. I enjoyed in writing and hope you will all enjoy in going through.

I have also gone through web site (http://ism62.com) which he has developed with lot of enthusiasm & love; and his soft copy of souvenir brought out at this reunion, is befitting honor to all those who made it to that day. I have collected few photos for my blogs, from this web site along with matter, which I have edited in my own way. I did enjoy your batch souvenir, given to all who attended to carry with them these beautiful memories now recorded for life time.

Last but not the least:

Your batch indeed has added yet another mile stone in ISM history.

In summing up, I believe whole program-me was very well organized, along with fun of chit chatting, meeting & greeting old timers, indoor and outdoor games, with cultural activities, awards ceremony, meetings etc. Which went through for 3 days? I will pen down here by saying, you all had “A Thrill of Life Time”.

Lastly now ball is in the courts of 1963 batch, and we wish them all the success and that they keep the momentum on – going, keeping in mind, time will just fly out, and we will see them at next “Basant of Feb’ 2013”.

I will pen down here, and look forward to write blog for 1963 batch in 2013.

Arun Talwar (’71 Mining)

30th May’ 2012
==================+++++++++===============+++++++++++=====

Note:

An electronic copy of Souvenir if someone wants, we can send by email.
Full Collection of photos for Golden Jubilee can be seen on the web site or by clicking links below in Picasa Albums, wherein you can write / add description against each photo or your photo by logging into Google, in case you would like to do so.
Links for G J C Photos are as follows, only thumbs UP photos are coming small, will be uploaded again, to give a good slide show.

G J C Photos-04^th Feb’12_261

https://picasaweb.google.com/talwar1948/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb201206thFeb20121962Batch?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCMDGh5ul5pqpRw&feat=directlink

G J C Photos-05^th Feb’12_153

https://picasaweb.google.com/talwar1948/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb201206thFeb20121962Batch02?authuser=0&feat=directlink

G J C Photos–06^th Feb’12_145

https://picasaweb.google.com/talwar1948/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb201206thFeb20121962Batch03?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCN6bicHKsPfrjQE&feat=directlink

G J C - 12^th Feb’12_Photos_34

https://picasaweb.google.com/talwar1948/GoldenJubileeCelebration04thFeb201206thFeb20121962Batch04?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCN6bicHKsPfrjQE&feat=directlink

One of the link is not working, will sort it out in next few days, as I am not able to figure out, the reason.

Get Together Cum AGM - ISMAA Delhi Chapter !

2012-01-31T20:40:00.000-08:00

Get Together Cum AGM - ISMAA Delhi Chapter -

06th November’ 2011

at Bawal, about 60 Km from Delhi.

I wrote few words which I am catching up from my Diary, regarding New Delhi Trip – Sept’ 2011 to Dec’ 2011 and I quote:

“I take this opportunity to wish you all a happy, peaceful & healthy New Year 2012, we are already finishing first month of New Year. Lot many make new resolutions what all they want to achieve in this New Year other take stock of what all has been achieved and few will make themselves in the history down the lane. Who knows what and where world takes us, if we have taken step on this mother earth, one day we all will go slowly and it’s inevitable”.

“Further without a doubt the year of 2011 would remain one of the memorable years of my life, firstly I had an opportunity to get our batch, seniors and juniors connected with the today’s electronic world, if not all a substantial figure of 850 to 900 individuals coupled with telephonic calls person to person and later followed by my trip to New Delhi, India, which strengthened my desire, faith and belief – it was just incredible journey and for me now to write this great experience”.

ISM Mates get together / AGM ISMAA - Delhi Chapter:

Some time early part of last year, I got connected with Mr. Suresh Mehta ('62 Mining), and came across his web site, (www.ism58-62.com/ - of late I find this site is not opening up) and activities of ISMAA Delhi Chapter, especially the words he has well recorded and they echoes our hearts and hope it does for all Alumni’s as we used to sing and remind us of great attachment to our great institute of learning, fondly we all used to call Mining College, when you are back to school era days: His quote is as follows:

"Na Kabhi Judaa Honge Wo Saathi Hamare"

"Mile The Sabhi Jo Dhayia Ke Kinare".

Once I landed in my home country, and after getting my daily routine put in order for medical check up with Apollo Hospital – Specialist in Urology, spoke to him and showed my desire to meet, which he gladly accepted.

I wrote to Mr. Suresh Mehta (’62 Mining):

Today, I thought some thing, which I wanted to share with you, before I send my conversation to all. I would love to meet you, our seniors/juniors/classmates who are settled here in New Delhi and I would also like to see, I am enrolled with Delhi Chapter, as this is my home country/town, where I grew and had my best of education, when later we had best at ISM, which has its rich traditions, which is making us come close as clock is ticking as days, years and decades pass by.

Is it possible to have get together as I am still around until end of this month, schedule to leave for NZ in the first week of Nov' 2011 fingers crossed, to as many who could possibly could join as some may have there other engagements, due to marriage / Diwali season ahead.

We had many conversations over phone and most important being that I should attend ISMAA – Delhi Chapter AGM and will also give me an opportunity to meet & greet him not to mention all seniors, juniors, classmates who are settled in and around New Delhi.

I was not very sure then due to my return booking of 05^th Nov’ 2011, as they were scheduled much earlier to 06^th Nov’ 2011 date I come to know for the get together being organized. But did mention him fingers crossed, if for any reason my date with flights confirmation etc are re-scheduled, I will certainly join you all. As it happened, my flights were re-scheduled as my Doctor at Apollo Hospital wanted some more time, to see follow up of the medication he was prescribing for my medical condition etc.

Mr. Suresh Mehta (62’ Mining) along with Mr. N N Gautam (’62 Mining) were very kind to invite me to join there AGM cum get together at Bawal about 60 Kms from New Delhi on New Delhi - Jaipur HWY which was wonderful & amazing experience. Photos below are testimony of how every one was enjoying to there thrill and catching up with there mates.

15^th Oct’ 2011 Mr. Suresh Mehta (62’ Mining) wrote:

Dear Arun,

Thanks a lot for your mail. The get together of ISMAA Delhi chapter is scheduled for 6th November at Bawal, about 60 Km from Delhi. I am sending you the attachment of the notice. The same can also be viewed at www.ismmaadelhichapter.com.

As luck would have it, Delhi chapter is indeed looking for some space to hire presently before we build our own building. The right person to contact is my batch mate Mr. N.N.Gautam. I am giving below both our mobile numbers although the same are also printed in the notice of AGM cum Lunch.

I had my cataract surgery done 2 days ago and my doctors have advised me as not to move for a week but thereafter I shall definitely come and see you. I know Jangpura Extn well, so please send me your address. I shall pick you up and take you for lunch at my NSCI Club.

Best Wishes, Suresh Mehta

Finally on the day, we assembled & traveled from Lodhi Road, designated spot by bus, bus started a bit late around 9.30 am to 10.00 am, but we had lot of uncertainties on the way, when the bus started showing signs of a problem to pull us any further. At that stage we had left N Delhi behind and were on State Jaipur HWY.

I know how Mr. N N Gautam kept

on ringing to find alternative solutions, for us to reach Bawal. Bus stopped on the way, driver and bus owners were being called, some of our mates were looking for hiring taxis etc. But late than be never, later bus did make it to destination and we all forgot once we reached the venue.

This AGM cum get together followed by sumptuous lunch & drinks and the whole show was very well organized. We had snacks, drinks to every one likings both soft and hard and tasty lunch with deserts plentiful.

In the course of deliberations of AGM, I was invited to say few words, which I did on behalf of me and my wife and on behalf of us living in Australasia – Australia & New Zealand ISM mates, I handed a bottle of wine as token of love and remembrances of school days, and how strong bondage we all have, which I can say with great PRIDE, NO INSTITUION IN WHOLE OF WORLD HAS IT!

I have traveled quite a lot across the globe to different parts of the world, either on study, holiday or on working assignment etc. or where I am now settled (Auckland, New Zealand). My firm convictions are – ISM Mates do not need any introduction, to meet there alumni’s settled across the globe. My doors remain always open to one and all, and also have a great desire to see if we can make a difference in meeting our mates & make them comfortable in a new place / environment etc. In college days, is that not true, when ever we used to leave for summer vacations training, our first reaction was to our teachers, who is from our college as MINE MANAGER.


Left to Right -Y K Sharma ('85 Pet. Engg.), B K Sinha ('70 Mining), Pradip Gangopadhyay ('70 Pet. Engg.), I J Talwar ('70 Mining), P.S. Upadhyaya ('70 Mining), B.K. Jain ('70 Appl. Geophy.) & V K. Mitra ('70 Mining).

I also got from Mr. Pradeep Gangopadhyay (’70 Pet. Engg) mail dated 27^th Jan’ 2011, who arrived N Delhi on 03rd Dec’ 2011 later in the day, whilst I left early morning hours by flight to Honkong on way to Auckland. He met few of his mates on 04^th Dec’ 2011, so I thought to be appropriate to add as I knew most of them in this report itself with photos. Sorry, I missed you, had it been a day in between.

He also visited Bubaneshwar on 19th-20th Dec' 2012, to meet in person his classmate Mr Sangram Mishra ('70 Mining) who had been sick and was having treatment for Cancer. His burning desire to meet him at his place, where few snaps were taken. I wish I could have met him, but could not.

I did manage to speak to him, when I got his news of sickness, while he was having treatment at Hyderabad, and wished him speedy recovery. He later sent me email of our association & meeting together at Mosaboni Group of Mines, with S K Patnaik way back in 1972 - 1974. I wrote him back, how memories have faded away on my side possibly due to my few car accidents etc. But hats off to your memory, even when his health was fragile but was knowing what all was going around him and was keeping cheerful at all times.

I have got those and am placing it below:

Mr Sangram Mishra ('70 Mining)

L to R: Mr Sishir K Patnaik ('68 Appl. Geology), Mr. Saroj Panja ('70 Mining),
Mr Sangram Mishra ('Mining) & Mr Pradip Gangapadhyay (Pet.Engg)

Group Photo at Sangram's Mishra Home,
who knew this will be last meeting with his classmates!

Mr. S K Patnaik & Mr Sangram Mishra in deep thoughts

As I have updated, this page (May' 2012) I am also deep in pain to pen down, that our dear friend Mr. Sangram Mishra has left us for heavenly abode on the morning of 03rd May' 2012. Our sincere condolences are there with his family. He fought his ailment, like a real miner, and knew he has to go - so join with me to pray to God Almighty that his soul rest in peace. We will miss him from core of our heart's.

Few of our mates, wrote back who could not have been present being away from N Delhi, please see what Mr. Ajoy K Chaterjee has to say.

17^th Dec’ 2011 Ajoy Chatterjee (1960 Mining) wrote:

Dear Arun,

Enjoyed going through your mail with many photographs of Delhi Chapter of ISM Alumni Association. R P Prashara (’58 Mining) was a fine athlete in our time at ISM. J K Mahajan (’58 Mining) was two year senior to us. J S Chawla my classmate spent sometime in Zambian copper belt when S N Thakkar (1956 Mining) was sent on deputation to Zambia from DGMS (Directorate General of Mines Safety) for a few years. He is now settled in Goa; same as me.

We had many occasions to be with J K Mahajan & family. In fact if you have a chance to see Golden Jubilee Volume of ISM, you will find a group photo of us as members of Goa Chapter.

I sincerely thank you for your mail and wish a speedy recovery from your ailments. God Bless!

Ajoy Chatterjee (1960 Mining).

As I am completing my this report, 1962 batch is heading for Golden Jubliee celebrations which is being held at ISM, Dhanbad on Sunday - 05^th Feb’ 2012. Hope most of our seniors from 1962 batch, will be attending there Golden Jubilee celebrations, and many will join from around the globe.

I would request and make an appeal to all ISM mates; it’s your time to meet your mates, some after many decades, on your 50th Anniversary. On the same note will request our seniors to share with us, how all went through coming SUNDAY – which will write yet another historical chapter in ISM history.

Mr. J K Mahajan facing and Mr R P Prashara

I also had an opportunity to meet some of my Mosaboni work mates namely Mr. J K Mahajan with Bhabhi & Mr. R P Prashara with Bhabhi, class mate Nav Kumar (’71 Mining) & few known faces near our batches like Mr. P S Upadhayay (’70 Mining), J Sahai (‘1970 Pet.Engg) from Toranto, Canada.

I took few snaps, on this get together, which does gives how close we are in this world.

Nav Kumar sitting in blue shirt

L to R - Mrs Mahajan, Mr. Prashara (standing) & Mrs. Prashara enjoying tea

Few others whom I met in person or was introduced are Mr. J S Chawla (’60 Mining) among so many others known like Mr. M S Shambi (’66 Mining), Mr. R B Upadhyay (’65 Mining), Rajinder K Khosla (’61 Mining) & many more.

Ladies striking numbers on Tombola Ticket

Tombola / Housing Session On

Tombola Session On - Mr. Shambi & Others

Ladies Corner

J Sahai holding camera for the shot & R S Saxena Centre Seated

Mr. N N Gautam ('62 Mining) Standing

Last but not the least, I must thank every one, for what a wonderful afternoon I

enjoyed with our fellow mates,my personal thanks goes to Mr. Suresh Mehta, Mr. N N Gautam & Mr. Ram Upadhaya ('65 Mining), who made my this visit very pleasant and I will cherish this as great memory, till we meet again, God willingly.

Cheers, Arun Talwar (’71 Mining) Jan’ 2012

UPDATED- May' 2012.

Memories - Then and Now !

2011-06-15T15:55:00.000-07:00

THEN - P K Thakur

FLASH BACK OF ISM DAYS:

When I was young, I could remember everything that had happened and even some things that never happened. Today it is different. My mind has better comprehension but not as well for retention.

The best memory of ISM, of course, is the friends I made and the education I received, which I believe is the best we got in good old days. But the events that had a lasting impact on me are only two: one sad and one happy.

Day of Sadness:

On February 19, 1958, Chinakuri 1 and 2 Mine exploded and one of our alumni died along with 175 miners. The school was closed on the 20^th February’1958, to pay respect to the departed souls. I did not know any of the victims but felt very sad for the tragedy and cried. I prayed for knowledge so someday I can eliminate such tragedies in the mines. (You may not know this but I always pray for anything and everything I want in my life; some silly, some very profound.) I made up my mind to get higher education and learn how to get the mine gas out of mines in my year’s to follow.

R K Agrawal, Late D N Thakur and I took summer training in Chinakuri #3 mine in 1959 and planned on getting Ph.D. To this day I rejoice that dream became a reality as all three of us finally did so. Later working in Chinakuri 1 & 2 mines as PGPT, my desires became even stronger. Today I am so happy & thrilled in penning down, that my wishes were fulfilled beyond my wildest dreams & imaginations. Thanks to CONOCO and CONSOL Energy. I have traveled North America and the rest of this world many times teaching and preaching methane drainage to save lives, improve productivity and use the deadly gas for creating revenue for the coal companies.

Day of Happiness:

The second event on happy note happened same year in June’1958, I got married on June 26, 1958! But we began to live together only when I finished my First Class Mine Manager’s Examination (FCC) in 1964 and Meera finished her BA from Ranchi University. As we all know, that the marriage in Northern Bihar is consummated in two parts; the wedding (more like a betrothal) and “Gauna”- official arrival of the bride in her husband’s house. But I used to sneak out with her (as her family & folks lived in Dhanbad) to see a movie and have some ice-cream whenever I could afford it (did not have much money). Some of my classmates knew about it and all had a lot of fun off course at my cost. The ISM school bus always stopped at my in-law’s house on the main road whenever we were going out on mining excursions or other wise. I had to go in and say hello to my folks; it did not matter if Meera was there or was at her school. Prabal Dutta was the biggest trouble-maker. Too bad he is not coming to our Goldie reunion. I wish his wife gets better and they can travel.

Me and My Wife

Meera is my love of life - a true co-traveler on the journey of life. The attached picture shows us at our 50^th anniversary. We raised two good kids. Life is good on most days. We still fight for trivial things but on the whole we all know how many wedded couple who would have never fought and that's how love blossoms.

Let me pen down here, as I have unlocked my great school memories, which I am sharing with my mates, by quoting Shakespeare:

"I count myself in nothing else as happy as in a soul remembering my good friends. (Richard, II)"

NOW - PK Thakur

It is hard to even think in my wildest dreams of forgetting our good old school day’s friends, and it’s with that great excitement I have in mind to meet all, yet at Goldie’s reunion of our batch when hopefully we all will share our destinies and our days spent together at school.

God bless ISM!

Pramod K Thakur (61’ Mining)

Golden Jubilee 1961 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2011 (By Dr Pramod C. Thakur - '61 Mining).

2011-03-14T00:24:00.000-07:00

Dr P K Thakur

Dr. Thakur has further added nostalgia of classical / musical evening enjoyed by him & his class mates. This has been described in his own words in the email received by me, which I feel honored on behalf of my seniors to share on my blog.

Dear Mr. Talwar,

Thank you for an excellent job.

I would like to add to what J P Goenka wrote about our 50^th reunion as a cultural correspondent for the Class of 1961.

Main ISM Building Glittering at Night

The main Indian School of Mines building was very well decorated - like a bride from the main gate to the main buildings. She just looked awesome & beautiful! I walked around the campus with my wife for hours enjoying all flowers. We stayed at the ISM Guest house.

I missed the old “Champa Tree” (no longer there; I used to pluck a few flowers for my wife when I was a student there) and the franzipeni were not in bloom but the roses & marigolds were in full bloom and this did made up for my loss.

The breakfast, lunch and dinners were sumptuous and comprised a great variety of Indian cuisine.

The two cultural programs, organized are as follows:

5th Feb' 2011:

The program opened with Chants from “Durga Saptasati”. A Sanskrit scholar recited the prayer by Devas. I knew every single verse in the prayer because I have been reciting them for a long time.
The next item was a beautiful song in rag “Bageshwari”. It is the raga for scholars and is really sweet. Finally Ms Usha Uthap with her orchestra made the audience regaled with her fingers on strings & bringing beautiful music to our ears which we all cherished during function in progress and thereafter.

06th Feb' 2011:

The program opened with the singing of an accomplished singer from Dhanbad, Sri Rameshwar Baba. He staged two songs, for packed audience:

First was Rajasthani Mand (a kind of raga) with words like, “Pardesi Balama Padharo mhare dware” - (O long-gone beloved, you are welcome in my home ---).
Second, breath taking song (called “Hori” usually sung at this time of year) in raga Kafi that had words like, “Rashia Berjori; Ankhian me Dare Abeer” - (my beloved is placing scented powder in my eyes by---).

Being an aficionado of Indian classical music, I thoroughly enjoyed and believe all our fellow class mates did enjoy the program, but some may have varied opinion.

I commend the current student body for putting up such high quality programs. The present students were most courteous and helpful. The total number of students I was told are now 2,300 with over 200 young ladies.

I understand it was quite expensive but am glad they could afford it, more so to make the event more memorable to all of us. We all will cherish this memorable evening for days to come in our hearts.

Pramod Thakur ('61 Mining)

07.03.2011

Golden Jubilee 1961 Batch Reunion – A Report Feb' 2011 (By J P Goekna - '61 Mining)

2011-03-04T01:57:00.000-08:00

Panoramic View of Get Together

It was a casual chat between Mr. J. P. Goekna & Mr. V. K. Arora in early months of 2010 that the seed of 1961 batch reunion was sowed. The plant did blossom on 5^th February 2011. You will all agree it was a Herculean task to locate all the 150 batch mates which had settled all around the globe in the past 50 years. It can be said due to electronic / fast communication world of today, coupled with great enthusiasm and zeal shown by our batch mates, it was finally possible. ‘Mission Impossible’ was made into nostalgia of tomorrow. Those who attended made a history, but those who could not attend have sent there very good wishes & excellent job done in making this memorable reunion possible.

The following batch mates made their presence in Dhanbad.

Baijnath Pd Gupta	Geology
Ram Chandra Singh	Geology
Zoeb Moad Mogri	Geology


Bipin Kishore Prasad	Mining

Himatlall Velji Solanki	Mining

Indrajit Khosla	Mining
Jagannath Prasad Panda	Mining
Jagdish Prasad Goenka	Mining
Jogeshwar Sharma	Mining
Kamala PD. Singh	Mining
Lalit Kumar Srivastava	Mining
Lalta Prasad Upadhyaya	Mining
Murlidhar Prasad	Mining
N.P.Srivastava	Mining
Nem Chand Jain	Mining
Rajendra Dayal Tawakley	Mining
Rajendra Kumar Khosla	Mining
Rajendra Paul Gupta	Mining

Ram Lall Arora	Mining
Ramji Srivastava	Mining
Shivanand Prasad	Mining
Shri Niwas Sharma	Mining
Vinay Mahajan	Mining
Virendra Kumar Arora	Mining
Chitaranjan Kr. Singhal	Petroleum
Deoki Nandan Sarraff	Petroleum
M.S.Agarwal	Petroleum
Ram Gopal Aggarwal	Petroleum
Deb Sankar Sinha	GeoPhysics
Pramod Chandra Thakur	Mining
Brajendra Kumar Sinha	Petroleum

Our hearts goes to overseas alumni who came all the way from USA to make this a nostalgic get together.

Indarjeet Khosla
Pramod Chandra Thakur along with his wife Mira
Zoeb Mogri along with his wife Shera.

Every body heart was beating when that moment came and that all who attended exchanged there memories, with there fellow mates some after 2, 3, 4 or 5 decades.

Great Event missed by few:

Hriday Narayan Khanna missed his train because of wrong information available on net. Every one was sorry as his absence was dearly missed.

Extra Effort for some who made it even against all odds:

Dhanbad Railway Station

Kamala Prasad Singh was due to arrive at Dhanbad Railway Station by Purva Express on 5^th morning at 11.30 a.m. This train - Purva Express from Delhi was running 12 hours late and touched Dhanbad Railway Station past midnight (12.30 AM) on 6^th February. Even at that odd hour he was well received by Sitanshu Pandey (President, ISM Students Union) with his friends at the Dhanbad, Railway Station and at EDC by J P Goekna’s daughter Deepali & son-in law Vikash and grandson Madhur. Every one will agree what a zeal was shown by all those who were involved to make Goldies Reunion a memorable event of there life time.

Vinay Mahajan was also to come by this Purva Express but because of late running of train he flew from Delhi to Kolkata and took a taxi from Kolkata to Dhanbad, not to miss the event.

High Lights of the Programme:

Brief outline of the program enjoyed by 1960 alumni along with friends:

Welcome Kit, Mementos & Photos:

A welcome kit was presented to all the participants with dry fruits, a hat and a name badge.
Memento and Blazers were distributed at EDC. Instant photographs duly framed were presented to each recipient of memento. Professor S.P. Banerjee attended the function and enjoyed the company of his friends-cum-students.

Food & Play:

After lunch on 5^th February at EDC the ladies played cards. Rummy coaching classes were conducted by Mrs. Khosla and Mrs. Singhal and in the process the teachers were richer by a few hundred rupees and that allowed all those who did not know how to play.
Housie was conducted by Vikash Jain, Deepali, and Madhur. Everyone enjoyed the game. Inderjeet Khosla swept the floor of betting.

Poem recited was instant hit:


Mr. J P Goekna Extreme Right

A poem – ‘Mujhe Kabool Kar Lo’ was recited by J.P. Goenka which was well received by the audience.

Miscellaneous Activities:

A group photo session, which has now become a historic get together for 1961 mates.
At Koyla Bhavan Community Hall all enjoyed Usha Uthup’s singing program.
Later Mr. T.K. Lahiry and Mr. P.S. Mishra took us to exclusive enclosure for 1961 batch get-to-gather.

Other Activities:

The 1961 reunion golf tournament which was played in Delhi on 9^th December 2010, its winners were given away prizes, trophies by Mrs. T.K. Lahiry –

2^nd runners up – R.K. Khosla / 1^st runners up – S.N. Sharma / Winner – J.P. Goenka

Memento’s were also presented to Prof. T. Kumar – Patron ISM Alumni Association, Mr. T.K. Lahiry CMD - BCCL, Mr. P. S. Mishra, Mr. U Kumar (1957 Mining) and Sri G. C. Mirig (1957 Mining) who all graced the function.

Basant Sports enjoyed by Goldie’s:

On 6^th February after having breakfast at EDC all Goldies joined the Basant sports event.

Even age did matter, not to break bones or stretch muscles etc. but some of mates did try to play badminton.

Memory down the lane when you enter your own hostel room:

Old Hostel Room

Few of Goldie’s went to hostel rooms in which they had put up fifty years ago as students. It was yet another trip down the memory lane visit which hopefully all will cherish. And lovely remarks, as rightly said by J P Goekna that they felt fifty years younger. People can rejoice, or recollect the locking arrangement we had, with two round clamps + tower bolt, to tie up two different locks, so that when seniors used to stay with us, each could have access to room.

In the evening Alumni Association parent body meeting was held. Some took a round of ISM campus. The whole face of campus has changed with the addition of new buildings. Prof. T. Kumar informed that an amount of Rs. 500 Crores will be spent in the near future on new buildings / infrastructure in addition to having an exclusive wing for ISM alumni & comfort.

As night fall, the whole of ISM campus was very well illuminated for the National Sports to be later held on 11^th and 12^th February’ 2011.


ISM Beautiful Decked Princess

What a nostalgia words used for our great institution? – ‘ISM was looking beautifully decked princess.’ by Mr J.P Goekna.

Acknowledgements:

1961 Goldie’s acknowledge with thanks:

1. Prof. T. Kumar and his colleagues for giving all the support.

2. Mr. T. K. Lahiry and P. S. Mishra for all the arrangements made by them.

3. Dilip of CIMFR and Sitanshu Pandey, President Students Union, and his friends for arranging the transport and receiving the visitors even at odd hours.

4. Mr. P. C. Thakur, Inderjeet Khosla, Amrit Sagar Chopra, V. K. Arora for their contributions.

5. Mr. R. K. Khosla, S. N. Sharma, S. K. Chawla, L. K. Srivastava, Pradip Gangopadhyay and Delhi 1961 batch for arranging souvenir publication and making our reunion enjoyable.

6. Mr. Vikash Jain, Deepali Jain, Master Madhur Goenka for their enthusiastic participation and taking care of the alumni.

7. To one and all whose name has been unintentionally / inadvertently left / missed, but, have contributed in making this reunion a successful & rewarding event.

Historical Photo:

1961 Goldie’s group photo as rightly pointed by Mr. Pradip Gangopdhaya - 1970, P.Tech, has now become a historical photo for all generations to come, and also inspirations to all those Goldie's day for coming batches - yet to be celebrated.

Let us take fondly lessons / help / ideas from this batch to make next event more memorable.

It’s now turn for 1962 passing out batch who’s Golden Jubilee Reunion will be next year. They should start there preparations right now.

Cheers to one and all that made this great event a mission possible.

J.P. GOENKA

1961 – GOLDEN JUBILEE RE UNION TEAM

NOTE: CD of high resolution photographs prepared by Vikash Jain and will be couriered shortly.

PS: Edited to give more of a nostalgic feelings. Hats off to all who made it!

ISM Alumni 1961 batch_Feb 2011

2011-02-22T15:18:00.000-08:00

My first group photo I got from our great friend Pradip Gangopadhya, from 1970 Petroleum Eng Batch, who is connecting us to Global ISM Family, and I am trying to place it on my blogs, to keep our fellow brothers, seniors and juniors to add there memories.

Possibly if some one could upload there batch photo, when they passed out, which normally was taken in front of ISM Main Building. Some body may have in his album, get it scanned and place it on the blog, with your comments.

How did U all felt it being once again together after a span of 50YRS i.e 5 decades, when most of you must be retired and enjoying with your family, grand children etc. See how time has flown just like it was yesterday.

I salute you one and all, to allow me to say, that's great. Our future generations in this electronic world will know, what graduates from ISM believed in keeping up the traditions, its values and also to help there younger brothers when they happen to come and help was extended, without any hesitation what so ever.

I have added the email received from Pradip today what he has to say to our seniors:

All my seniors from ISM 1961 batch:

Everyone from ISM is aware of the fact that 1961 batch - it was a Golden Jubilee Celebration in addition to Annual Basant festivities, when present students invite and rejoice there festivities with seniors.

This is definitely a historic photograph that I would like share with our ISM community around the globe. The picture identifies every individual with name.

I've spotted some of the people from 1961 batch whom I met recently like Mr. J.P. Goenka (Mining), Mr. V.K. Arora (Mining), Dr. Ram Gopal Agarwal (P. Tech). I've also seen the pictures of Mr. Rajinder Khosla (Mining), the man who worked tirelessly behind the scene & put together the souvenir, and Dr. Pramod C. Thakur (Mining) who communicated with me on various matters regarding ISM Alumni golden jubilee celebration. However, I didn't see the pictures of Mr. Amrit Chopra (Mining) whom I met in Muskat, OMAN or Dr. Zoeb Mogri (Applied Geology), whom I met at Calcutta's Geological Survey of India office in 2006 with my classmate Late Shankar Basu Mallick (1970 Applied Geology). Also missing is Mr. Surendra K. Chawla ( P. Tech), who communicated with others quite a bit regarding 1961 batch golden jubilee celebration.

One other thing I need to mention here about Saraf-sahab. If I recall correctly, Dr. Deoki Nandan Saraf (P.Tech) came to ISM campus, and took our oral exam in the 4th year of B.Sc Part I exam -- the year was 1969. I believe, he was then a professor at IIT, Kanpur with Chemical Engineering Dept. We heard that he returned to India after completing his doctoral program from Stanford University. I could be completely wrong but that's what I recall. If I'm wrong, just just feel free to let me know.

I got into the loop if ISM 1961 batch golden jubilee celebration because of Mr. Goenka, Mr. Arora & Dr. Ram Gopal Agarwal. I supplied some of the information at the initials stages & provided list of 1961 alumni available in our ISM Alumni Association of North America (ISMAANA -- non-profit org.) database.

I'm hoping more pictures would follow soon.

Special thanks to Mr. Vikash Jain who is kind enough to send this picture to all of us. It seems Mr. Jain has some connection with Goenka-sahab (J.P. Goenka '61 Mining) -- their e-mail address are similar and probably working together.

Except for the limited number folks from 1961 batch, all others are going to receive this information/conversation via blind copy to minimize the exposure of our ISM Alumni list.

Next year the 1962 batch would celebrate their Golden Jubilee at ISM, and I know a lot of seniors from 1962 batch.

With best regards, I remain,
Pradip Gangopadhyay,
1970 Petroleum Eng. Holly Springs, North Carolina, USA

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