PEC students’ audio guide app to aid tourists

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 3

In keeping with its motto to explore, innovate and excel, students of the PEC University of Technology, Chandigarh, have developed an audio guide application for the Chandigarh Administration.

The students have developed this guide for the three museums: The Natural History Museum, Sector 10-C, Architecture Museum, Sector 9-D, and Government Museum and Art Gallery, Sector 10-C, Chandigarh. The aim of the application is to aid tourists and provide them with a wholesome experience of pleasure and learning. The technical inputs have been given by the students of the PEC University of Technology, Chandigarh. The map of the audio tour has been developed by the students of the Chandigarh College of Architecture for the same.

VP Singh Badnore, Governor, Punjab, and Administrator, UT, Chandigarh, inaugurated the audio guide at the Government Museum and Art Gallery, Sector 10, today in the presence of Parimal Rai, Adviser to the Administrator, Chandigarh Administration, Anurag Agarwal, Home Secretary, Kriti Garg, Director, Museum and Art Gallery, Dr Manoj K Arora, Director, PEC University, Kapil Setia, Chief Architect, SD Sharma, senior most architect and other officials of the Chandigarh Administration.

The project has been developed under the supervision of Home Secretary Anurag Aggarwal and Kriti Garg and has been set up under the guidance of Dr Manoj K Arora, and Sanjay Batish, head, Computer Center, PEC.

The guide has been developed by a team of undergraduate students of the university headed by final year students, including Sakshi Vohra, Pulkit Puri, Karunveer Singh and Akshay Arora. The voiceovers for the audio guide have been provided by Sanjiv Dosajh in English, Puneeta Bawa in Hindi and Komal Saini Pathak in Punjabi. The tablets having the in-built apps shall be provided by the respective museums to the tourists.

The apps have been developed keeping in mind the regional population and hence support recordings in English, Hindi and Punjabi which inform the visitors about the most interesting features of the highlights of the respective museums. The sections covered are textile, metal sculpture, stone sculpture with emphasis on Gandhara sculptures, miniature painting and Indian contemporary art. Photographs have also been added to add to the experience. While addressing the gathering, Badnore expressed his happiness over commendable work done by the faculty members and students of PEC University and the Chandigarh College of Architecture by getting the audio guide ready in minimal cost and in short duration. He expressed happiness that the museums in Chandigarh have also now adopted the audio guide system. He further added that, “It has been a pleasure to see that the students of the city colleges and universities are being involved in such projects.”