Apart from personal travails and joys, the team also found itself strapped for cash which was needed to make an advanced underwater vehicle like Varun.
The biggest difficulty the team faced was generation of funds either through government sources or private oragnisations. The boys contributed money from their own pockets to keep things going and hoped that the sponsors would chip in at a later stage and bail them out of a tight corner.
"While most of our industrial sponsors are abroad, we sincerely wish the Indian industry takes heed of this so that research projects such as these do not face funding problems," says Akshay about the problems they faced. "Thanks are also due to National Instruments, Kontron, Fischer Connectors and Xsens for helping us with all that they could," he adds.
"It was a long and tough battle where all of us had to put our heads together to ensure a good and lasting solution to the underwater robotic submarine Varun," says another team member Toushar Chakrabarty highlighting their achievement.
"Dr R K Sinha, assistant professor, department of physics, helped us a lot in achieving what we have done," admit the young engineers working on the project.
"Now the project has been kept in the lobby of DCE along with previous projects so that it inspires future engineers in the college to undertake similar projects with greater vigour," says Dr Sinha.
"This is one of the many prizes that our boys have won and brought name and fame to the nation. Under the able guidance of Dr R K Sinha, the team of youngsters had to overcome many difficulties. First, they had to convince the ministry of science they had a good chance of finishing in the first top ten teams," says a proud P B Sharma, director, DCE.
Image: Autonomous Underwater Vehicle, Varun.
Also see: Meet India's youngest MTech from IIT
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