Ahuja receives 2012 BITS Pilani Distinguished Alumnus Award

CSL Professor Emeritus Narendra Ahuja recently received the BITS Pilani Distinguished Alumnus Award for 2012 from his alma mater, The Birla Institute of Technology and Science for his significant and outstanding contributions to academic teaching and research.

Narendra Ahuja

The award “came out of the blue,” Ahuja said. Ahuja said he did not know the details of the award beforehand and so it was a “complete surprise” when he received the email and phone calls letting him know that he had been chosen.

The award was given to a total of four BITS alumni, and awardees were chosen by a panel based on the awardee’s contributions to three things: the dissemination or creation of knowledge, the enrichment of the lives of people, the distribution or creation of wealth, or the promotion or establishment of high ethical standards in private or public life.

According to its website, “BITS has provided the highest quality technical education to students from all over India” over the years, and “Its graduates may be found throughout the world in all areas of engineering, science and commerce.”

Ahuja, a professor in the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and CSL at the University of Illinois, received his undergraduate degree from BITS in Electronics Engineering, and later graduated from the University of Maryland in 1979 with his Ph.D.

He is now also a full-time faculty member in the Beckman Institute Artificial Intelligence group, and his overall research is in computer vision, which includes everything from next generation cameras, to 3D computer visions, to human-computer interaction.