Association of Engineers: Jodhpur Railway was a well administered and well developed metre gauge railway of erstwhile Jodhpur State. It had an identity of its own at Jodhpur with its imposing office buildings, workshops, officers bungalows and staff quarters scattered on both sides of the railway line. After independence and the merger of Jodhpur State in Rajasthan and the integration of Jodhpur Railway with Indian Railways, Jodhpur Railway became a division of Indian Railways, under the control of Divisional Superintendent of Jodhpur Division of Indian Railways. Railway club of Jodhpur had a magnificent building and liberal facilities for indoor and outdoor activities, including tennis, squash racquets and badminton. Subsequently, a stadium was added, butting with the lands of the club. There were very limited places for relaxation and socializing at Jodhpur at that time. Naturally, most of the railway officers tried to find time, to spend some evening hours at the railway club. In course of time, some enthusiastic railway officers formed an association of engineers. Membership of the association was extremely limited. However, it provided opportunities to the members for informal get-together and chat once or twice a month. I had some memorable time on the squash courts of the club in early morning hours and on tennis courts in the evening, during my early years at Jodhpur.
Association of engineers moves to the Polytechnic: Jodhpur Polytechnic was gradually finding its feet. There was an all-round surge of activities at Jodhpur Polytechnic. That was the time, when the office of the association of engineers was moved from the railway club to the polytechnic. We started inviting all engineers working at Jodhpur for participation in the monthly meetings of the association, including members and non-members. In the process, a large number of engineers working in government departments, defence services, local industries and commercial establishments had an opportunity to come into contact with each other. As days rolled on, sumptuous dinner began to be served after every meeting of the association, on the lawns of the polytechnic, surrounding the swimming pool of the institution. There was nominal charge from the members and non-members for the dinner. There was no charge for dinner for the ladies accompanying the members. They were considered as guests. These dinner meetings were extremely popular and relaxing and most of the members utilized the opportunity to bring with them their senior officers and other distinguished guests. These informal contacts among members were extremely helpful in the development of fraternal feelings and were of considerable help in pooling inter-departmental resources for the solution of tricky problems of the community.
Institution of Engineers: Institution of Engineers was established in India in 1920 and got the royal charter in the year 1935. Institution of Engineers is a multi-disciplinary body of professional engineers of the country with centres and sub-centres spread all over the country. The head quarters of the Institution of Engineers is located at Kolkata. Rajasthan state centre of the Institution of Engineers was inaugurated in the year 1959 at Jaipur. The land for the building of the institution was made available to Rajasthan Centre by the state government and the process of construction of the building of the centre commenced with initial grants from the institution and the state government. During the monthly meetings of association of engineers at Jodhpur Polytechnic in sixties, there was a reasonable sprinkling of members of the institution of engineers. Gradually, non-members attending the monthly meetings of the association of engineers started applying for membership of the institution of engineers and as soon as Jodhpur had requisite number of corporate members, a sub-centre of the institution of engineers was established at Jodhpur. The land for the construction of the building of the sub-centre of the institution of engineers was provided by the state government and the construction of the building was taken up with the help of initial grants from the institution of engineers and the state government. Jodhpur Polytechnic had the privilege of hosting the office and activities of Jodhpur Sub-Centre of the Institution of Engineers, for almost four years, before the movement of the sub-centre to its newly built premises. Jodhpur sub-centre of the institution of engineers has now been raised to the status of Local Centre of the Institution of Engineers.
Games and sports activities at Jodhpur in sixties: Games and sports activities at Jodhpur during the sixties were extremely limited. The soil was sandy, there was scarcity of water and it was difficult to maintain suitable playgrounds. However, there was an extremely good scattering of keen sports persons in major government establishments, including railways, post and telegraphs, Rajasthan Armed Constabulary and defence services. Jodhpur Polytechnic had been able to develop substantial facilities for outdoor games and sports in an exclusive area spread over eighty acres. Apart from, that, there was a swimming pool and indoor games facilities for table tennis and badminton. This provided sufficient attraction for most of the sports people to develop some mutually beneficial association with the polytechnic. Some of them were national level players. They could see that there was a place, where they could get some facilities to play and to hone their skills for participation in their departmental sports and tournaments and we found that their association, skills and experience could help us in coaching and mentoring of our students. While, they were willing to spend an hour or so with our students in the evenings, as and when they happened to be free, we assured them a slot of an hour or so in late evenings for intensive practice sessions. Gradually, we were able to assemble a dedicated team of coaches and mentors for the games of hockey, football, volleyball, basketball, table tennis and swimming.
Regional Centre of Rajasthan State Sports Council: Rajasthan State Sports Council had established a regional coaching centre for different games and sports at Jodhpur. It was located at the stadium and a number of coaches from national institute of sports were assigned to the centre. The grounds and other physical facilities available at the stadium were very limited. Looking to the facilities available at Jodhpur Polytechnic, Rajasthan State Sports Council shifted the centre to the polytechnic. We provided living accommodation to the coaches in the hostels and involved them in coaching selected students of the polytechnic and other educational institutions of the town. Some of the coaches were very dedicated and talented and gradually their services were sought regularly by the university and local colleges and schools for fine tuning the skills of their teams, for state level and national tournaments.
Know your scooter: During the late sixties, the scooter was fast entering into the realms of common man’s vehicle and most of the people were trying to own a scooter. It had assumed the role of a family transport and the roads could be seen with throngs of people riding scooters merrily, carrying with them, their wives and children. We had developed a weekly course titled ‘know your scoter’ and were running it in the evening, two hours daily, for six days in the week from Monday to Saturday. The course was not meant for job seekers and there was no intention to turn out technicians or mechanics through the course. The only intention was to make the owners of the scooter, familiar with the working and inside out of their vehicle, to enable them to look after it and to maintain it in a good running condition and if anything went wrong or needed repairs or replacement, the owner could see, what went wrong and what repairs or replacements were needed. The course was totally user oriented. Everybody participating in the course was expected to bring his own scooter. On the first day, the scooter available in the workshop was stripped to familiarize the participants with different components and assemblies of the machine. and everybody was free to have a look at the dismantled parts and to handle them. Next two days were utilized to encourage the participants to try their hands on their scooters by dismantling different components and assemblies and refitting them after oiling and cleaning. With some confidence pouring in, the participants were requested to prepare a list of worn out parts of their scooters, which needed replacement. The replacements were done by the participants on the fourth day. Fifth day was reserved for servicing, fine tuning and maintenance and road test. Final day was a fun filled day reserved for exchange of experiences, hand shakes and bye bye. The courses became extremely popular and there were cries for more and more such courses. In extreme cases, we received requests from Rajasthan Armed Constabulary and Border Security Force to run courses for them, specifically for the brands of motorcycles in use in their units.
Vocational Programmes: There was a lot of unemployment and underemployment in the country during the seventies and number of educated employed was increasing day by day. Consequently, it was felt that the students should be diverted after secondary education to vocational training programmes, in the fond hope, that, most of them will be able to set up their own business or will be readily picked up by establishments for their commercial skills. Perhaps, under this context, I was nominated as the convener of vocational training programmes of the Board of Secondary Education Rajasthan and was authorized to run some higher secondary (vocational) programmes in the polytechnic, as pilot projects. I was provided full freedom to identify the courses, develop the curriculum and to conduct the examinations. Consequently, the following Higher Secondary Vocational Courses were run at Jodhpur Polytechnic during the session 1973-1974:
(1) Auto-mechanics, (2) Motor winding
Duration of both the courses was one year. The minimum qualification for admission was a pass in secondary school examination of the Board of Secondary Education. There were no lectures, no theory papers and no theory examinations. The students did not have to take any notes or to do any written work or to prepare journals. All instructions, teaching and learning was by actual work on the machines in the workshop. Detailed write ups were provided to the students for giving procedural instructions, guidance and information about different types of machines and machine parts and for purposes of reference and record. The students handled all types of work in the workshop and facilities were provided for the development of commercial skills.
It may be interesting to note that the state government permitted the appointment of master craftsmen involved in commercial work for appointment to the posts of technicians and instructors for these courses, waiving all restrictions of academic and professional qualifications. Board of Secondary Education awarded certificates of Higher Secondary Examination ( Vocational ) to the students on the basis of practical work done during the session and practical examinations of the students.
Science teachers of class VII and VIII of secondary schools: Nurul Hasan was the central minister for education in the early seventies. During a meeting of the co-ordinating committee of the All India Council of Technical Education, it was felt that there was need for providing a substantial push to the teaching of science in secondary schools. Stumbling block appeared to be the lack of physical facilities for the establishment of suitable laboratories and to equip them for the conduct of practical experiments. Consequently, with the concurrence of Director of Primary and Secondary Education of Rajasthan, we undertook to train two batches of science teachers of class VII and VIII of secondary schools of Rajasthan at Jodhpur Polytechnic during summer vacations. The duration of the courses was six weeks. The number of trainees in a batch was sixteen. The schools provided a sum of Rs 300 only to each trainee towards the cost of components for the assembly of equipment for different experiments. The syllabus was divided into 32 topics for lectures and every trainee was assigned to choose two topics for the preparation and presentation of model lectures. Reading and reference material for the lectures was provided to the trainees, to help them in delving deep into the basics and to write out the lectures in a language which could be freely understood and assimilated by the students of grades VII or VIII. Thereafter, sixteen practical experiments were identified for each class. Every trainee was provided the option to choose any one of the experiments and to assemble or fabricate workable equipment for the experiment and to write out procedural instructions suitable for the students of Class VII and class VIII. Teachers of the polytechnic were assigned to serve as guides and mentors and the facilities available in the laboratories and workshops of the polytechnic were freely made available to the trainees. After the presentations of model lectures and demonstrations of experiments by the trainees, the lectures were reviewed and edited in the light of discussions and the thirty two lectures were duplicated and were bound in the form of books to serve as a manuals or text books. Similarly, the procedural instructions of sixteen practical instructions of experiments were duplicated and bound and sixteen sets of equipment for the conduct of the experiments were assembled or fabricated. When the trainees left Jodhpur Polytechnic after the course, every trainee carried with him two bound copies of lectures, two bound copies of instructions for the conduct of practical experiments and one set of equipment or apparatus for the conduct of sixteen experiments.