The Indian Institute of Architects’ (IIA) first virtual National Convention (IIA NATCON 2020 – TRANSCEND) was held successfully from 11-12 July.
The virtual inaugural ceremony was addressed by the Vice President of India, M Venkaiah Naidu. He urged the architects of the country to adopt and promote green architecture and use renewable energy in upcoming projects.
Industry experts spoke at six sessions over the two days, and they were attended by people from across the country. The speakers included Rahul Mehrotra (Founder, RMA Architects), Marion Weiss & Michael Manfredi (Weiss/Manfredi), Sonam Wangchuk (Engineer & Founder, SECMOL, Ladakh) and Moshe Safdie (Safdie Architects).
The first day’s programme had three sessions – Transcend, Resilience and Innovation. The topics were presented by the industry leaders such as Jelle Therry Ramboll (Ramboll Studio), Sanjay Mohe (Mindspace Architects), Rita Soh (president of ARCASIA), Debatosh Sahu (Espace), Naresh Narasimhan (Venkataramanan Associates), Parul Zaveri (Abhikram), Vivek Bhole (Neo Modern Arch), Mitesh Dixit (Domain), Jit Kumar Gupta (architect & town planner), Krishna Rao Jaisim (Fountainhead), Monolita Chatterjee (Design Combine), Vaissnavi Shukl (GSD), Sheila Sriprakash (Shilpa Architects), and Azmi Wadia (Azmi & Sarosh Wadia).
The theme for the second day was – Inclusiveness, Self-Reliance and Inclusiveness & Innovation. These sessions were joined by industry leaders such as Biju Kuriakose (ArchitectureRED), Sameep Padora (sP+a), Abin Chaudhuri (Abin Design Studio), Vinayak Bharne (Moule & Polyzoides Architects), Leena Kumar (Kumar Consultant), Divya Kush (president of IIA), Habeeb Khan (president of COA), Jabeen Zacharias (president of IIID), V Suresh (chairman of IGBC), Satish Magar (president of CREDAI), Tushar Sogani (TSDPL), Amarja Nimbalkar (Amarja Nimbalkar Associates), Michael Samuelian (Samuelian Consulting LLC), Ameet Babbar (Babbar & Babbar Architects) and Fahed Majeed (Amarja Nimbalkar Associates).
