Sabir Nishat (sabirnishat554@gmail. com) Come August, India's public television network, Doordarshan, will be hosting the international finals of the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union Robot Contest (ABU- Robocon) from August 21-23, 2022 at Thyagraj Stadium in the national capital. The two-day national competition was hosted by Doordarshan and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi at Thyagraj Stadium on July 16-17.
Prior to this, a two-day event was organized on December 15-16, 2021, as a curtain raiser to DD Robocon 2022, wherein feedback and suggestions on previous Robocon competitions were shared by experts and interactive sessions held with participating teams. Abu-Robocon was hosted by China in December, 2021. Teams from Nirma University and Gujarat Technological University (GTU), Ahmedabad, who were the finalists, represented India in the global chapter of the competition.
On behalf of Prasar Bharati, board member Shaina NC received the ABU Robocon Flag from Shandong Radio & TV Station China, to host ABU Robocon 2022 international contest in New Delhi. DD-Robocon is a national competition organized by IIT Delhi for Asian-Oceania college robot competition, organized internationally by Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU). According to ABU Robocon, the contest aims to create friendship among young people with similar interests who will lead their countries in the 21st century, as well as help advance engineering and broadcasting technologies in the region.
In the competition robots are pitted against each other in completion of a task in a set period of time. ABU-Robocon, founded way back in 2002, completes its 21st anniversary this year. As many as 43 teams were shortlisted from 80 teams from engineering institutes, which was held in the physical mode after a gap of two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
More than 150 professors, technical staff and students from IIT Delhi and its neighbouring colleges, including JNU and Jamia Millia, volunteered to organize the mega event with finesse. This inter-institute competition was backed both technically and event managed by IIT Delhi's not-for-profit companies namely Foundation for Smart Manufacturing (FSM) and I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics (IHFC) - Technology Innovation Hub of the Institute, as knowledge partners. "This year's DD-Robocon is special as the event will be followed by the international show, ABU-Robocon 2022, on August 21, with teams from 13 countries participating," said a senior programme functionary of DD.
Witnessing the event with one robot trying to outsmart, outwit and outclass another robot in a fixed timeframe was a memorable, exciting, fun-filled affair. The theme this year of DD ROBOCON is Lagori, one of the most played games in childhood. Lagori is a traditional and one of the most played ancient games that originate in the southern part of India.
It was one of the most popular games in India around the 1990s. One can find the game history in Bhagavata Purana, a Hindu religious text written around 5,000 years ago. It mentions that Lord Krishna played this game with his friends.
The game is between two teams (Team 1: "Seeker" and Team 2: "Hitter") and the game starts by throwing a ball by the seeker to break a stone tower called "lagori". While the seekers try to pile up the stones again, the hitter throws balls to interrupt them. Buoyed by this theme, the men and machines - robots - were seen in action breaking the "lagori" and trying to pile up a set of five numbers of round shaped objects.
And that, too, to keep the ball perched delicately on the top from not falling down. Some made it at one go while others failed to do it at the given time. Some were attacked by the opponent robots even before they could accomplish the task! Breaking the "lagori" and piling up was the first stage of the game followed by picking up of the balls and placing them at the net and then firing them simultaneously to displace the balls set on each four corners of the stage in just 45 seconds was by no means an easy task.
It was all about precision and accurate timing - with the robot and the team maneouvering it having to work in perfect tandem. Institute of Technology, Nirma University from Ahmedabad, which has a proven track record having won the Robocon India competition 11 times, emerged the winner when they beat Government College of Engineering and Research, Avasari (GCOEARA), Pune by 10 points. Nirma scored 65 points while GCOEARA 55 points.
Hope this time around India, which has so far made it to the quarter-finals stage only, will be able to put up sterling performances to go beyond that stage and emerge as champions. After all, the theme of this year's event, "Lagori", is a traditional game over which we have gained mastery down the ages and it might be our crowning glory! Quite a good number of engineering institutions from Maharashtra, especially Pune, made entry to the event. Five teams from Pune alone viz.
, MIT World Peace University, Bract's Vishwakarma Institute of Technology, Government College of Engineering and Research Avasari, Pimpri Chinchwad College of Engineering and Pune Institute of Computer Technology - made it to the quarter-finals stage with two teams from Gujarat and one from Maharashtra. Interestingly, there was not a single institute from the North-East or Eastern region making it to the national competition. That was hugely disappointing given the fact that there are so many engineering institutions, IITs and IIITs, in this part of the country.
Are we lagging behind in the field of robotics or are there other factors that are acting as a spanner in the wheels of progress of robotics is concerned? Do we need curriculum on robotics and automation more relevant to the industry and not just limited to mechanics and electronics? Is there dearth of sponsors coming forward to foot the expenses in making the expensive robots, transportation and other costs? Do we require states' patronage to enable the engineering institutes with a pool of abundant latent talents to emerge on the national and international arenas? The world has seen tremendous technological advancements in the field of robotics with countries like Japan and China and even Vietnam in the Asia Pacific Region contributing significantly towards it. Robots, a great product of human mind, have enabled tasks, even difficult ones to be performed in a hassle-free manner with precision and pinpoint accuracy. The robotics revolution is rapidly accelerating, as fast-paced technological advances in automation, engineering, energy storage, artificial intelligence and machine learning converge.
The far-reaching results will transform the capabilities of robots and their ability to take over tasks once carried out by humans. Already, the number of robots in use worldwide multiplied three-fold over the past two decades, to 2. 25 million.
Trends suggest the global stock of robots will multiply even faster in the next 20 years, reaching as many as 20 million by 2030, with 14 million in China alone. The implications are immense, and the emerging challenges for policy-makers are equally daunting in scale. There is no iota of doubt that the rise of the robots will boost productivity and economic growth.
And it will lead to the creation of new jobs in yet-to-exist industries. But existing business models in many sectors will be seriously disrupted and millions of existing jobs will be lost. An estimated up to 20 million manufacturing jobs are set to be lost to robots by 2030, that comes to 8.
5 per cent of the global manufacturing workforce. Leaving aside the seamier aspect, it must be acknowledged that robots are changing the world by helping humans do things better (with greater efficiency) and doing things that were not possible before. Robots facilitate disaster response, augment physical abilities, serve in areas where there's a need for interaction with people, and enable exploration beyond the boundaries of Earth.
Robotics has applications not only in the field of manufacturing or assembly lines. It is also used in medicine as exemplified by the Phoenix exoskeleton and robotic surgery. Moreover, robots are taking over human jobs deemed too dangerous vis-a-vis in places with high radioactivity or toxic contamination.
Robots are changing the world in mostly positive ways. They may be taking over some human jobs, but they also create better efficiency that, in turn, boosts economic activity, thus generating more opportunities for humans to find ways of enhancing income. .
