Warmest greetings on the auspicious occassion of the 18th Foundation Day of the Rizvi College of Architecture.

On behalf of the students, staff, faculty, management and my personal behalf I send you the greetings fromthe RCA family. It has been a wonderful journey in the quest for excellence in architecture through holistic education. We would like to share our experience and happiness with you all.

We had Prof. Ashish Ganju from Delhi the other day and we had an inspiring interaction with him on the issue of change. We shall have a low key college level function today with Prof. Madhav Deobhakta talk on Change in the seminar hall on the 6th floor. Students have put up an exhibition of their college and NASA works. Arch Fest has been postponed until the health situation improves in the city.

The syllabus of B. Arch. at the University of Mumbai is being restructured. Your suggestions are most welcome.

We are proposing to restore the semester system and we are required to follow the 3+1+1 system formulated by the Council of Architecture, where the the stage I shall consist of three year programme followed by stage II which will have one year of professional practice and a year of academics.

We will be glad to hear from you about your progress, studies and works. Please do send us the details along with brief write ups,drawings and photos, which will go a long way in inspiring the students.

with lots of love and best wishes,

AKHTAR
Prof. Akhtar Chauhan
Director
Rizvi College of Architecture

He had submitted his proposal for a study of public transportation systems and facilities in different countries.The internationally acclaimed British architect Norman Foster wrote that although RIBA had received a large number of high quality submissions from world over Faizan’s proposal was found to be outstanding and a worthy winner of 6000 pound sterling traveling scholarship.

Faizan is preparing to submit his final year design dissertation in May and then he plans to travel around the world as per the proposal.

He would give a presentation on the issues in London in late 2008 or early 2009 at the conclusion of the traveling scholarship.

~ AKHTAR

This was a benchmark event in the life of the college then just six years in existence.

Held at the Andheri Sports Complex and attended by nearly 75 member and observor colleges from India and a few colleges from abroad too, VASTUTSAV brought an Annual Convention of NASA to Bombay after nearly a decade.

For many students from the frst batch…the batch of 1992 this was the swansong to a glorious and fantastic career as students at RCA.

It also created a rock solid foundation upon which students in the years to come excelled at NASA.

Today RCA is a force to reckon with at any NASA convention. We have won the Le Corbusier trophy on numerous consecutive occassions in the last years.

VASTUTSAV was held at the Andheri Sports Complex from Dec 17-20, 1997. The evening started with a fantastic opening ceremony tracing the architecture zeitgeist in India at the time and then culminating in a 45 minute rock show by Remo, a fellow architect and one of India’s great artists.

Over the next days the regular high energy scenarios continued as the small crew of 2000 host college students tried to make everyone happy. Most students never went home. A few never slept.

A Fashion show by the students of the college was another event that was long remembered after the convention was over.

How NASA came to RCA is a story that will forever remain part of the RCA urban legend and right through the year the support of Prof. Chauhan, Prof. Shetty and Prof. Shakti Parmar went a long way in making the event a success.

To a generation of students right from the Batch of 1992 to the batch of 1997 who had just come in, the 40th Annual NASA as host college students will forever remain a great memory.

As years have passed since that event and students have moved on, these memories form some of the defining moments in the life of RCA and its students past, present and future.

Prof. Chauhan has been at the helm of affairs as Principal/Dean/Director of RCA since the first day on August 26, 1992. His dedication, focus, energy and above all a passion for education has been the single largest constant in the success of RCA over the years.

We all wish you the best of health, happiness, prosperity and many many more years of guiding RCA and the extended family.

Saturday 03rd of November 2007 India has around 140 schools of architecture that produce about 4,000 architects each year. But only about 40,000 architects are registered with the Council of Architecture to serve a population of over a billion.

‘Since the number of architects is grossly inadequate, most of the architectural work in the country is carried out by non-architects: engineers or masons who double up as petty contractors,’ says a review of the profession.

Further, though architects like to consider themselves a part of the westernised elite transforming the country, their actual status in society as effective professionals is low, says one of a series of papers published in the latest issue of the German architectural journal Archplus, focussing on ‘India’s Insular Urbanism’.

This special issue was released in time for the Nov 1-3, 2007 Urban Age conference held in Mumbai. This conference was part of a series of nine being held between February 2005 and November 2009 in New York, Shanghai, London, Mexico City, Johannesburg, Berlin, Mumbai and Sao Paulo (December 2008) and Istanbul (November 2009).

Architect, urban planner and conservation consultant A.G. Krishna Menon contends that the advice of Indian architects is ‘routinely substituted by others who hold influential opinions about the architectural product, thus reducing the economic worth of architectural service in the marketplace.’

In India, engineers have greater authority in deciding architectural issues compared to architects ‘whose contributions are reduced to merely manipulating the facade of the building under construction’.

Menon argues that the ‘burgeoning of architectural schools’ in India over the past decade-and-a-half led to a ‘precipitous drop’ in educational standards, and the shortage of architects worsened the ‘debilitating colonial pedagogic agenda that imparts vocational training’.

There is praise however for some institutions – the School of Architecture at the Centre for Environment and Planning (CEPT) of the University of Ahmedabad, the Kamala Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute of Architecture and Environmental Studies (KRVIA) and The Rizvi College of Architecture in Mumbai.

Indian architecture has also gained from some locally produced magazines like Architecture+Design published from Delhi and The Indian Architect and Builder published from Mumbai. Issues of sustainability and low-cost housing are more widely appreciated, says Menon.

Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs adjunct associate professor Jyoti Hosagrahar views Indian architecture and urbanism as a ‘failure’ to become ‘modern’ in European terms, and also its ‘failure’ to remain true to its inherited forms.

She points to problems in definitions, saying: ‘Fundamental to the emergence of modernity as a global project was Western Europe’s colonization of Asia and Africa.’

The Archplus introduction to this focus on India notes that Indian urbanism has gone through a range of trends – the mood of upheaval in the period after Independence, as reflected in Le Corbusier’s planned city of Chandigarh, along with many other public buildings and projects, the search for identity during the 1970s and 1980s, and the socio-economic impact of liberalisation during the 1990s.

Questions about urban planning were also raised at the Urban Age conference. Mumbai-based planner Shirish Patel said: ‘We have no planners in the city (Mumbai) any more. The government has dismantled the planning process. We instead have a set of development control regulations, which are laid down by the government.’

Urban Age sees itself as a ‘worldwide investigation into the future of cities’ and is jointly organised by the London School of Economic and Political Science, and the Alfred Herrhausen Society, the international forum of the Deutsche Bank.

Original article link here

Smit Patil a member of the first batch of RCA [RCA92] passed away due to malaria on April 24th.

Her batchmate Abhijeet Patankar [RCA92] informs ARCA

Dear friends. after Minal Panchal… there is another real sad news for Rizvi Alumni.. Smit Patil (batch of 92′) lost her life on 24th April. She was suffering from Malaria and didn’t recover from it. She was working in Tanzania with her husband. I do not know any more details about it as i was informed about this by Kanchan Patil [RCA92]. May her soul rest in peace and may god give enough courage to her family members. We are with them at this tragic moment. abhi

This is indeed a sad moment, and we pray for her soul. We also offer our condolences to her husband, child and family.

MUMBAI: As Mumbai reacted with outrage at the news of Minal Panchal’s death on a United States campus, another campus – this one at Bandra – recalled the dreams that she had for the city that gave her a chance to dream. 

Minal passed out of Bandra’s Rizvi College of Architecture, where – as a final-year student – she dreamt of designing a children’s museum to tap the creative potential of Mumbai’s kids. She had also planned to come back to the city and look for a place for the museum after completing her post-graduation from Virginia Tech.

Her college teachers on Wednesday found it difficult to hold back tears when they spoke of those plans. "Minal promised she would come back and design this museum," college director Akhtar Chauhan said as he turned the pages of Minal’s graphic dissertation on the same subject. Akhtar, who was personally involved in overseeing the project, called it "a unique concept" blending social and creative needs of a child growing up in a congested city.

Her project was chosen as the best in terms of design and innovation in 2003. "This gave her lots of confidence when she applied for her Master’s course," Akhtar said.

The current batch of students came to attend the annual examinations on Wednesday and stood on the corridors, peering into the notice board that displayed the latest newspaper clippings. "This should not have happened to her," said a final-year architecture student.

Over 50 per cent of the 45 students of Minal’s batch went abroad for higher studies after graduating in 2003.

But the death led senior teachers, like Jamshed Bhiwandiwala, to question the very idea of studying abroad. "This would never have happened in our colleges," he said. Minal had two batchmates, Vidya and Bharati, studying in Virginia Tech with her. "They are safe," Akhtar said.

Minal’s batch was like a close-knit family and kept in constant touch with each other through a chat group despite living in different countries. "I have been getting frantic calls from my classmates. Minal was such a jovial and happy-go-lucky person," a shattered Faizan Khatri, one of Minal’s classmates and close friends, said.

"She came to meet me before she was leaving for the United States," computer lab technician Mohammad Afsar, who taught her the basics of photoshop and computer graphics, said. Architecture design lecturer Anand Acharya said she was sensitive person and socially committed to her surroundings. "The only way to pay homage to her would be to kickstart the museum project she dreamt of," Akhtar added.

Original article can be seen here

The below is a message from Prof Chauhan, Principal, RCA.

MINAL PANCHAL RCA ALUMNI KILLED IN VIRGINIA TECH SHOOTOUT

Minal Panchal, 26, a RCA graduate was killed in the shoot out at Virginia Tech, USA. She was among the 32 students and faculty members who were killed. She had joined the Virginia Tech only six month ago to undertake a Masters program in Advanced Building Science.

Minal Panchal studied architecture at Rizvi College of Architecture and graduated in 2003. prof. Pradnya Chauhan taught her Basic Design in 1st year and Architectural Design in 2nd year. Minal was a very keen observer and her sense of design was highly developed. her housing project in Rajasthan was quite articulated, and she was also very good in structures. She could weave aesthetics in visual language and structural systems quite harmoniously says A.Prof. Pradnya Chauhan who taught Minal in the early years of the course.

She scored the highest grades in the design dissertation in her class. Under the guidance of Prof. Akhtar Chauhan, she did her thesis on Children’s Museum at Borivali which reflected her deep humane concerns. She was committed to the ideals of evolving sustainable architecture which though innovative blended harmoniously with nature. She was a very sincere, patient and a sensitive student who worked hard and pursued the quest for excellence in architectural design, says Prof. Akhtar Chauhan, Director, Rizvi College of Architecture.

She is survived by her mother and her elder sister. She lost her father three years ago. Her father was an architect who encouraged her to take up architecture as her professional career. Her mother was visiting the sisters in the USA.

Dr. Akhtar Hasan Rizvi, President, Rizvi Education Society expressed his profound shock at the loss of brilliant student. He shall join the faculty and students of Rizvi institutions in the condolence meeting which has been organized by Rizvi Education Society on 19th April 2007 at 2.00 p.m. at Rizvi Educational Complex, Sherly Village, Off Carter Road, Bandra West, Mumbai 400 050.

May God bless her noble soul with eternal bliss and peace in her heavenly abode.

Prof. Akhtar Chauhan
Director
Rizvi College of Architecture

Mudit Saxena, (RCA93) informs

A very sad and disturbing news. Minal Panchal (RCA98) an alumni of Rizvi College has died in the shocking mass shooting incident at Virginia Tech on Monday. She was from Rizvi’s batch of ’98, and was pursuing a MS degree in Building Science at Virginia Tech. She is survived by her mother and sister. Shrikar Bhave (RCA98) and Bharati Karmarkar(RCA98), both RCA Alumni and batch mates of Minal, are at the campus to help and support the family through this heart-breaking tragedy.

Our prayers are with the family of Minal and we wish them the strength to overcome this heinous tragedy.

ARCA

Alumni of the Rizvi College of Architecture "Friends For Life"

http://rcalumni.org