VIDYALANKAR STEPS INTO ITS GOLDEN JUBILEE YEAR

'Beautiful hands are those that do Work that is earnest and brave and true Moment by moment The long day through.

- Dr A P J Abdul Kalam

Vidyalankar has just stepped into its fiftieth year, with style. What started in October 1960 as an effort to impart engineering education to needy students, by our founder Shri C S Deshpande, has today attained the status of a widely recognised and respected name among education institutes in Maharashtra. Although, this year Vidyalankar commemorates a 'Golden Jubilee Year', looking back at our five-decade-long history, every year seems to have been as good as a golden year. Vidyalankar has always believed in being a principle-centered and learningoriented organisation. Its excellent results have made the organisation radiate success. Someone has rightly said that continuity gives us roots and change lets us stretch to reach new heights. The consistent and dynamic growth pattern of Vidyalankar bears testimony to this fact.

Initiated with a view to train students for the AMIE courses, the institute soon started offering diplomas in engineering. This was followed by consistent growth that was marked by the opening of various centres for teaching at Nerul, Thane, Vashi, Dombivli, Andheri and Borivali.

Winston Churchill said, "To improve is to change. To be perfect is to change often". Its social need and desire for growth prompted Vidyalankar to change and achieve perfection. Towards this end, a Trust was established with one of its main objectives being the spread of education in information technology and engineering. This led to the opening of the Vidyalankar Institute of Technology (VIT), an engineering degree college affiliated to the University of Mumbai, in 1999. The year 2002 saw the establishment of Vidyalankar Polytechnic, a diploma college affiliated to MSBTE, and Vidyalankar School of Information Technology (VSIT), another college offering BSc (IT) and BMS. The organisation also started postgraduate MMS and ME courses in 2007 and 2008 respectively (See the growth map for important milestones that exhibit the materialising of our founder's vision and mission).

Today, Vidyalankar is not only a leader on the education front but it also creates leaders. In short, Vidyalankar can be described as a journey and not a destination. The institute will continue providing an environment conducive to the pursuit of knowledge and will always encourage its students to achieve their highest potential.

Team Vidyalankar