The EGM sessionThe evening kicked off with Registration and filling in member data at the desks ably manned by Suresh, Veni, Balasundaram and Prem, volunteers from IIT MAA with good support from Ravi, Bhavani and Goutham. The Event started off with an Invocation Song sung very beautifully by Sreya Ramnath, which came out wonderfully, not withstanding the absence of a sound system. Deepak and Raghavan gave a welcome to all the members. Rohit Koshi got into the act and got an Ice-Breaker started to get the gathering together. Geet, the effervescent daughter of Sambhy of IITD, was a fantastic Emcee and was an Event Manager par excellence, better than the pros! There was active competition from the various groups formed, with the scene looking like an Inter-IIT meet on Culturals! This was followed by Tambola which had the families enthralled, with frequent gifts brought in by the ever-enthusiastic Rohit. The ubiquitous and enthusiastic Alamelu was everywhere, galvanizing the action. Chand got off a Finance committee meeting going quietly on the side, a' la PanIIT, with well-wishers like Raj, Santh, Ganapathi, Rangaswami, Suresh, Prakash to chalk out strategies for fund raising.

In the meanwhile the Club Members broke away for an office session for an EGBM. This meeting went off well with good support from all the members present. There was good appreciation of the fast growth of the Club as well as the various steps taken by the Managing Committee to bring it to this stage. Gautham gifted a wall clock to the Club, making it the first acquisition for the Club! Quite a few members, like Gopal, Rangaswami, Sabhanayagam, Inbarasu spoke and gave valuable suggestions. Unfortunately, due to a marginal lack of quorum the meeting could not be termed official and had to be repeated later.

High Fives for Team IITACOn conclusion of the GBM, informal networking started and members and family members spent a good time getting to know each other. Good spirits were evident and the mood was decidedly upbeat! The group was a max-mix, with industrialists, academics, entrepreneurs, movers & shakers and good old family members, with almost a Who's Who of Chennai-based Alumni, and every body had a roaring time. The height of enthusiasm was Karuna of IITM '99 batch moving around in his wheelchair and we promised him that the Club will have all facilities to facilitate the physically challenged people also. You can also see the photo album in the Club's web site. The gathering exceeded the expectations so much that food ran out many times and the tireless Venkatesh, our host in Presidency Club, just kept it coming on to ensure that no one went hungry. Balaji had a tough time keeping track of the member payments for the event which kept rolling in. Ananthanarayan had a tough time explaining the efforts taken to locate the premises! There were many stalwarts who have been supporting a club like this for many years, like Dalton, Raj, SR Kumar, LS Ganesh, KV Rangaswami and many others. We missed other supporters like Ananth Krishnan, DC and others who were away.

The thoughtful Rohit had also organized Gift Hampers for the Ladies which were the coup de grace of the evening and every one went off happy. There has been so much enthu from the spouses that we have now decided to entrust all the sub-committees to the spouses (who do the real work anyway!)

The evening has certainly whetted our appetite for such breezy get togethers and we, the members and our families, now eagerly look forward to the next one! Amen!
- N.Raghavan