Aliah University, a state university that created for the education of many of India’s minority populations, is about to become the first university in West Bengal with its own state-of-the-art ham radio club station.
The announcement was made in late February in connection with a seminar held on the Kolkata campus introducing students and faculty to various aspects of amateur radio. The one-day session, held on the 24th of February, covered emergency communications and radio technology and included hands-on experience for the estimated 250 attendees. It was led by members of the West Bengal Radio Club, the Indian Academy of Communication and Disaster Management and organized by the school’s Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering. A number of other schools have hosted similar amateur radio workshops throughout the region, which is a coastal area subject to violent storms and other natural disasters that rely on alternate forms of communication.