Shri A.K.Tripathy did his BE from REC Rourkela in 1969 and ME from IISC Bangalore in 1971.
Shri Tripathy worked for the Indian Industry for 36 years, out of which 4 years were in SAIL, 28 years in BHEL and 4 years in Central Power Research Institute. After retirement in 2008 he was Director Research at Silicon Institute of Technology Bhubaneswar Odisha, till Dec 2016. At present he is with PRDC as Chief Technical advisor at its Bhubaneswar branch. He is a Board member of CESU , and a member of the State advisory Council of OERC.
Prof Tripathy’s major contribution is in the field of analysis, design, engineering, and project management of a number of first of its kind projects in India. The first National HVDC project of India, the first 220 kV Series compensation project, the first FACTS(TCSC) project and the first Thyristor controlled line Reactor project for example were steered by his group. As Director General of CPRI, he made CPRI a member of the prestigious STL group of laboratories. He established the centre of excellence for advanced research (CCAR) at CPRI’s Bangalore unit, established testing facilities at Kolkata and Guwahati, signed MOU with KEMA Netherland for distribution automation and also introduced protocol testing facility for IEC 61850 at CPRI.
Shri Tripathy was chairman of ETDC of Bureau of standards and chairman of Transformer Standards committee between 2005 and 2008.
He was an active member of IEEE and was chairman of Bangalore section for 2006 and 2007. He is at present Chairman of India Council PES chapter of IEEE. He was awarded the P.M Ahluwalia award of CBIP in 2005, and recently the Sir Visvesvaraya award by the forum of Engineers Odisha in 2016
Sri Tripathy is a member of the Steering committee of National Mission on Power electronics Technology (NAMPET) projects for last ten years. Shri Tripathy is a Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE) since 2005.
My tenure as section chair IEEE Bangalore section 2006-2008: some remembrances.
A.K.TRIPATHY SMIEEE, FNAE, FIE (Past Chair IEEE Bangalore section)
I joined as Director General of CPRI in 2004 and by 2006, I was closely associated with the IEEE section activity. It is then that the request came to take over as chairman of the section. At first there was a hesitation whether I would be able to synch with a group of very eminent persons like Dr Surender Pal, Prof D. Rajgopal, Shri A. Raja Rao, Shri K. Ramakrishna , Dr V.Srinivas, Shri Ravi kiran ,Shri Hitesh, Col.H. Partha sarathy and others, but after one or two meetings of the executive body, I was overwhelmed with the support I got from each one of them and we began working as a motivated team.
A number of conferences , seminars, tutorials, Distinguished lecture programs, new student branches, competitions and participation in R10 meetings of IEEE followed and in Feb.2008 when I handed over charge , it appeared as if two years had passed too quickly.
I remember the active cooperation I received from Dr N.T Nair chairman India Council in holding the INDICON 2007 at CPRI. Same year at the IEEE R10 chapter chairs meet at Kotakinabalu (March 2007), the Indian team presented a good show with Mr N.T.Nair, Dr Ponnavaiko, Madam Mini Thomas and me taking the lead. The ‘new initiative proposals’ given by Mr. Nair, the then Chairman India Council IEEE, was specially praised by Dr John Vig the then President IEEE.
We had COMSWARE 2007, 2nd International conference at Bangalore in Jan 7to12, 2007.
Our section gave a lot of importance to old and new student branches in engineering colleges and every member of the executive body shared the responsibility of attending events organized by the students. I remember the mentoring offered by life fellow of IEEE, Mr A. Raja Rao and Col. Parthasarathy in several colleges. I remember to have addressed Canara college, GCE college, NMT Yalhanka and VVCE student branches.
We arranged several distinguished Lecture programs . ECE department IISc used to take the lead. Can’t forget the dynamic support the sectior received from Dr Anurag Kumar (present director IISc) , Dr Y. Narahari, Dr Binoy and others in organizing MCDES( managing Complexity in a Distributed world) conference, the centenary event of IISc at Tata Auditorium.
We had distinguished lectures from Bhumip Khasnavish in Dec 2007, Dr O.P Malik ,same year and Michael Lightner the next year. Computer Society held the third IEEE International conference on Software Engineering (ICGSE) between 17-20 Aug 2008.
Two very distinguished persons who visited during the period were Ms J.E. Mazierska, R10 Director , and Richard Goven , president IEEEE foundation and later Nim K Cheng president COMSOC . They adressed IEEE members and also the student members.
The IEEE section worked with close cooperation from IETE Bangalore section. Among several lecture programs held in IETE auditorium ( thanks to H.R.Parthasarathy) one which comes to mind was by Dr Srinivas Prasana on 16th Sept. 2007 on ‘Potential of Power line carrier communication’
During that period, Dr Surendra Pal was honored by a Life time achievement award from INAE on 7th DEC 2007 which brought delight to all office bearers of IEEE. Dr Pal , an outstanding researcher at ISRO was always available to advise me when I was in need. A large part of credit for excellent team work in the IEEE section goes to a very hard working person, Mr. K. Ramakrishna, who later rose to be IEEE Director in PES at the international level.
Around 2007-2008, the change of name from Power Engineering Society to Power and Energy Society was initiated. The Power and Energy society (PES) chapter of Bangalore was inaugurated on11th April 2007.
Dr Yadati Narahari , prof. IISc became Fellow of IEEE in 2007 which added honour to the IEEE community in Bangalore.
The section held several tutorials and on regular basis, one I remember was by Dr Lawrence Jenkins on ‘ Real time and Embedded systems’.
During that period, CPRI allotted a office space to the Bangalore section in its CCAR building premises.
On the whole, the memory of association with eminent people and students shall continue to be a prize possession and I shall be ever thankful to IEEE Bangalore section for giving me an opportunity to serve it and the Engineering community.
Suggestions:-
I am sure that the facilities available to the section and networking among members now would have considerably improved. I am also aware that the IEEE India Council after some gap has come back to its old dynamic self. The Bangalore section has bagged awards under large section category and maintaining its reputation. Student branches have increased in number.
The section could act pro actively in making technology reach common man, encourage innovation at school and college levels, take initiative in bringing out more women into professional engineering fold and emphasize on quality conferences and seminars in place of quantity.