President of India H.E. Mr. Pranab Mukherjee inaugurating the new dwelling complex.
The renovated ‘Rashtrapati Ashiana’, the historic Dehradun-based Presidential Secretariat of the Indian President will now have an AIT tag. The “Innovation Technology Demonstration Project” of constructing 12 dwelling units for President’s Secretariat at Ashiana in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India will be based on technologies researched and developed at AIT.
H.E. Mr. Pranab Mukherjee laid the foundation stone of the 12 dwelling units on September 27, 2016 — an event attended by AIT partners Dr. Praful R Naik, Director and CEO of Prashak Techno Enterprises, and IP specialist Dr. Siddharth Jabade.
The technologies developed at AIT that will be the basis of the renovation including the interlocking bricks based on AIT-Habitech Technology, and two innovative sanitation technologies developed under the Naturally Acceptable and Technologically Sustainable (NATS) platform at AIT. Work at the dwelling units is scheduled to begin soon, and it will be formally handed over to the Government of India before the middle of next year.
Pune-based Prashak Techno Enterprises will executive the project. The work order specifies that the construction of 12 dwelling units at the Presidential Ashiana will be based on “housing and sanitation technologies researched and developed at AIT.”
While the housing technology is based on the system of interlocking bricks developed by the Habitech Center at AIT; the sanitation component involves two NATS technologies — Anaerobic Buffer Reactor (ABR) and Constructed Wetlands. “While the ABR technology will be used for pretreatment and degradation of organic waste, the lotus-shaped wetland will serve to kill pathogens and remove pollutants enabling the effluent to be reused in green areas,” says Dr. Thammarat Koottatep, who has spearheaded NATS research at AIT. Habitech’s Mr. Gyanendra Sthapit will be visiting the site soon for a preliminary survey.
AIT had signed an MOU on 21August 2014 with Prashak Techno Enterprises for patenting and commercializing these technologies.
The Rashtrapati Ashiana, was originally built as the bungalow of the Commandant of the President’s Bodyguard is now being revived after long years of disuse. India’s tenth President KR Narayanan was the last President who stayed there in March 1998.
The President’s Bodyguard first established its summer camp in Dehradun in 1838 for summering of horses and remounts. The Commandant’s Bungalow was built in 1920, and it was renovated and re-designated ‘Rashtrapati Ashiana’ during 1975-76 to provide a suitable summer retreat and alternative to Shimla for the fifth President of India,
Shri Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed.
The Ashiana has been now renovated once again after retrofitting and incorporating adequate provisions of earthquake resistant features. The old irrigation system using canals has also been revived. It is located on the Rajpur Road of Dehradun and is surrounded by a fruit orchard of litchi and mango trees. The 12 dwelling units shall form a part of Ashiana.
More details about NATS and Habitec are available at these links
NATS: http://natstoilet.com
Habitech: http://www.habitech.ait.asia/
Prashak: http://www.prashak.com/
