Association for Computing Machinery

There are an increasing number of ACM chapters across India. Each of these chapters has a series of technical events that will provide you with both interesting technical content and career networking opportunities.

ACM India is pleased to announce the winners of the ACM India Student Chapter Awards.

We invited nominations from ACM Student Chapters from India, for the best and runner-up ACM India student chapter award to be given at the ACM India Annual Event February 14-16, 2014.

The participating chapters sent a report with details of their activities:

• Community Activities
• Community Service
• Website
• Recruitment Program
• Participation in ACM India Activities
• Membership Numbers

ACM BITS Pilani Student Chapter has won the Best Chapter award.

ACM IIIT Bhubaneswar Student Chapter has won the runner-up award.

Congratulations!

• ACM Professional/Special Interest Group Chapters in India
• ACM Student Chapters in India

Conferences

The ACM community in India is actively involved with a large number of conferences. Please see the Approved ACM Events in India listing page and the Annual ACM India Events page.

Travel Grants for Conferences

ACM India and the Indian Association for Research in Computing Science (IARCS) jointly offer partial travel grants to faculty, students and postdocs from India to present papers co-authored by them at premier international conferences. For more information, please visit the ACM India-IARCS Travel Grants page.

For Conference Organizers

ACM and SIGs (Special Interest Groups) lend the name of the organization to conferences which are fully sponsored by other nonprofit incorporated organizations. Such cooperation is to be primarily for publicity and to encourage Association members to participate by contributing papers and attending technical sessions. Cooperation specifically excludes financial participation, responsibility, or liability on the part of ACM. Please see http://www.acm.org/sigs/volunteer_resources/conference_manual/1-3incop for more information on how to apply for such cooperation.
For detailed guidelines, please use this guidelines document.

Current news and updates about the ACM Community in India are available on the LinkedIn group ACM India.

ACM India Eminent Speaker Program

The ACM India Eminent Speaker Program (ESP) provides local ACM professional and student chapters in India with direct access to top technology leaders and innovators who will give talks on issues that are important to the computing community.

Below is a list of available speakers. Please visit the Guidelines for Speakers and Guidelines for Chapters pages for information on the procedure.

Speaker / Affiliation / Title of Talks
1. Aditya Abhyankar, Dean, University of Pune.
   Talk 1: Research—Why, How and When?
   Talk 2: Towards Kernel Development in Machine Learning
   Talk 3: Wavelets—Trends and Tides
2. Arvind (Benny) Benegal, VP, Persistent Systems Ltd.
   Talk 1: Role of Security in Big Data Analytics
   Talk 2: How Secure are you from Insider Threats?
3. Ponnurangam Kumaraguru ("PK"), Assistant Professor, IIIT Delhi.
   Talk 1: Privacy and Security in Online Social Media (PSOSM)
   Talk 2: Designing Human-Centered Systems
4. Y. Raghu Babu Reddy, Associate Professor, IIIT Hyderabad.
   Talk 1: Are You a Software Engineer? Or Is It Just Your Designation?
   Talk 2: Model Driven Development with UML 2.x: Challenges and Opportunities
   Talk 3: Success Factors for Websites: Usability and Credibility
5. Sachin Lodha, Principal Scientist, TCS.
   Talk 1: Fun with Algorithms
   Talk 2: Privacy—Challenges and Opportunities
6. Neeran M. Karnik, Product Development Architect, BMC Software.
   Talk 1: Hints for Computer System Design
   Talk 2: CricInfo—The Technology behind the Early Days of Cricket Coverage on the Internet
7. Abhijat Vichare, Consultant.
   Talk 1: An Introduction to GCC Internals
   Talk 2: Alternate Models of Computation
   Talk 3: A Novel Way to Teach Operating Systems
   Talk 4: Mathematical Modeling in Computer Science
8. Madhavan Mukund, Professor and Dean of Studies, Chennai Mathematical Institute
   Talk 1: Automata and Program Verification
   Talk 2: Concurrent Programming: Old Problems, New Challenges
9. Santonu Sarkar, Professor, Computer Science and Information Systems, BITS Pilani, K.K. Birla Goa Campus
   Talk 1: Software Dependability for Next Gen Systems
   Talk 2: Software Engineering Challenges in Building HPC Applications
   Talk 3: Cloud Based Next Generation Service and Key Challenges
   Talk 4: Virtualized Environments—Benefits and Overheads
10. Mukesh Mohania, ACM Distinguished Scientist, IBM Research–India
    Talk 1: Big Data Analytics for Personalized Education
    Talk 2: Cloud Computing and Big Data Analytics: What Is New from DB Perspective?
    Talk 3: Analyzing Data and Content Together
11. Arun Bahulkar, Chief Scientist, TCS Innovations Lab TRDDC, TCS Pune
    Talk 1: Perspectives on Modeling Software and Systems
12. Vivek Kulkarni, Chief Architect, Persistent Systems Ltd.
    Talk 1: Theory of Computation
    Talk 2: Compiler Construction
13. Navin Kabra, CTO, ReliScore.com
    Talk 1: Which Programming Language Should You Learn and Why
    Talk 2: MS, MBA, or Job: Planning Your Career
    Talk 3: The Difference between Student Programmers and Professional Programmers
14. Ankur Narang, Senior Research Scientist, IBM Research Labs, New Delhi
    Talk 1: Distributed Scheduling for Massively Parallel Systems
    Talk 2: Research Directions in Large Scale Inverse Problems
15. Prasad M. Deshpande, Senior Technical Staff Member, IBM Research - India
    Talk 1: Unlocking the Power of Unstructured Data for Master Data Management
    Talk 2: Preventing Information Leakage from Unstructured Documents
16. Sameep Mehta, Senior Researcher and Manager, Information and Analytics Department, IBM Research - India
    Talk 1: Introduction to Knowledge Graph Stores with Applications
    Talk 2: Data Fusion Enabled Contextual and Personalized Insight Mining
17. Rajeev Gupta, Researcher, IBM Research - India
    Talk 1: Big Data, Metadata, and Beyond
    Talk 2: Continuous Query Processing: Concepts, Algorithms, and New Problems
18. Ashish Sureka, Faculty Member, Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology, Delhi (IIIT-D)
    Talk 1: Process Mining Software Repositories
    Talk 2: Mining Hate and Extremism Promoting Users, Videos and Communities on YouTube
    
19. Ramasuri Narayanam, Research Scientist, IBM Research - India
    Talk 1: Social Network Analysis: From Classics to Recent Advances
    Talk 2: Games on Networks: Modeling, Algorithms, Computational Analysis, Applications
    Talk 3: Computational Analysis of Connectivity Games with Applications to Social Network Analysis

IRISS 2015: 9th Inter Research Institute Seminar in Computer Science (held along with ACM India Annual Event 2015), February 5, 2015, Goa

• Call for CS PhD Research Abstracts

ACM Survey on PhD Production in India for Computer Science and Information Technology

• 2012-2013 Report (pdf)

ACM Survey on PhD Production in Computer Science in India

• Main Page
• 2012 Report (pdf)

Report on the Faculty Summit on Research and Innovation, 2013

• HTML Version
• PDF Version

Travel Grants for Conferences

ACM India and the Indian Association for Research in Computing Science (IARCS) jointly offer partial travel grants to faculty, students and postdocs from India to present papers co-authored by them at premier international conferences. For more information, please visit the ACM India-IARCS Travel Grants page.

ACM India Research Board (AIRB)

What is AIRB?
ACM India Research Board (AIRB) is a community of academics, researchers, and others who care deeply about enhancing the quality and the quantity of computing research done in India, particularly in the academic institutions. The Indian computing academic community is strong and has grown significantly in the recent years. While it is gratifying to see its growth, there is a lot more we can achieve, given the keen interest in CS among the students. Concerted action by all concerned is necessary in the future for research in India to reach the quality and recognition it deserves.

The Research Board is set up as a group within ACM India, which is a volunteer organization committed to advancing computing as a science and a profession in India. It is presently a collection of volunteers who are passionate about its goals and are enthusiastic in working towards achieving them.

What are AIRB's objectives?
The first goal of AIRB is to build a sense of community among the computing researchers in the academia and the industry in India. It aims to slowly become the voice of the Indian computing research community. This should facilitate interfacing with all sections of the society relevant to computing research: Government, Industry, Academic Institutions, and Students.

The CS research community should come together and work towards a planned and accelerated course in the future. A lot can be achieved by strategizing among ourselves towards a common plan. AIRB is keen to facilitate the coming together through specific activities and actions.

What are AIRB's activities?
The following activities have already been initiated by ACM India in the domain of research promotion:

• ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award
• PhD Production Survey
• Conference Travel Grant Scheme
• ACM-India MSR Faculty Summit 2013

How can you help?
AIRB seeks ideas and active participation of all in furthering AIRB's mission. As a first step, AIRB has started to reach out to the Head of the Department and/or other relevant individuals of the departments with productive research programmes in computing areas. Subsequently, all academic institutions with strong teaching or research in relevant areas will be approached with the request to participate seriously in AIRB's efforts.

Who are involved now?
AIRB is eagerly looking for more hands to help its activities. The following individuals are presently involved in different capacities, with strong support from ACM India as well as their respective institutions.

AIRB Chair: P J Narayanan, Director, IIIT Hyderabad

ACM-India President: Srinivas Padmanabhuni, Infosys Labs

DDA Coordinator: Supratik Chakraborty, IIT, Mumbai

PhD Survey Coordinator: Pankaj Jalote, Director, IIIT Delhi

Travel Award Coordinator: Madhavan Mukund, Chennai Mathematical Institute

Whom can I Contact?
Please use the email airb@india.acm.org or ResearchBoard@india.acm.org to communicate to the ACM India Research Board.

About the ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award
The ACM India Best Doctoral Dissertation Award was established in 2011 by ACM India with approval from the ACM Awards Committee. This award recognizes the best doctoral dissertation(s) in Computer Science and Engineering from a degree-awarding institution based in India for each academic year. There will be one award in 2014. The award will consist of a plaque and a cash component of Rs 2,00,000. In case of a joint award, the award amount will be shared equally among the recipients. The ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award page lists the current and past winners of this award. Details on the process and the jury are available from ACM India website.

About the PhD Production Survey
This study aims to collect reasonably reliable data on PhD production in CS in India, and also identify trends. This exercise is motivated by the Taulbee report in US. Prof. Pankaj Jalote, Director, IIIT-Delhi has been leading this effort on behalf of the ACM. First survey was done for AY 2011-12; in this survey only a set of about 40 institutions were included (those that a committee considered as having decent quality PhD program.) The methodology for that survey and the survey reports can be found on IIIT-D and ACM India sites.

ACM India and the Indian Association for Research in Computing Science (IARCS) jointly offer partial travel grants to faculty, students and postdocs from India to present papers co-authored by them at premier international conferences. For more information, please visit the ACM India-IARCS Travel Grants page.

About the Faculty Summit 2013
The Faculty Summit was a small step towards bringing the computing community together to start the process of brain-storming. It was attended by over 50 faculty members from 32 institutions and 18 researchers from 10 industry labs. The summit report and other details can be found on ACM India Research Page

New updates

• POPL 2015, January 15 - 17, Mumbai
• ACM India Annual Event 2015, February 5 - 7 and IRISS 2015, February 5, Goa
• ISEC 2015, February 18 - 20, 2015, Bangalore
• Report from Annual General Meeting, June 29, 2014
• Annual Report for FY 2013-2014
• Balance Sheet for FY 2013-2014
• Income & Expenditures for FY 2013-2014
• Report from Annual General Meeting, June 8, 2013
• Annual Report for FY 2012-2013
• Financial Statements for FY 2012-2013
• Minutes of Extra-Ordinary General Meeting, March 26, 2013
• Read the MemberNet India newsletter of ACM activities and people in India.
• Archives of past years reports & minutes

ACM India Best Doctoral Dissertation Award 2014

Supported by:

The Award

The ACM India Best Doctoral Dissertation Award was established in 2011 by ACM India with approval from the ACM Awards Committee. This award recognizes the best doctoral dissertation(s) in Computer Science and Engineering from a degree-awarding institution based in India for each academic year. There will be one award in 2014. The award will consist of a plaque and a cash component of Rs 2,00,000. In case of a joint award, the award amount will be shared equally among the recipients. Please see the ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award page for current and past winners.

Eligibility

Each PhD granting institution based in India can normally nominate 1 student for the award. Institutions that produce more than 10 dissertations in relevant areas per year can nominate 2 students. Each dissertation nominated for the 2014 award must have been defended successfully between August 1, 2013 and July 31, 2014.

Deadline

Nominations must be received by September 12, 2014 to qualify for consideration of the 2014 award.

Publication and Copyrights

Winning dissertations will be published in the ACM Digital Library. Each nomination must be accompanied by an assignment to ACM by the author of exclusive publication rights, as per ACM's copyright policies. Copyright will automatically revert to an author if her/his dissertation is not selected.

Nomination Procedure

Candidates must be nominated by the department from which the PhD was completed.

Each nomination must include:

1. Nomination letter by thesis advisor. This letter must include:

   • The name, address, and phone number of the advisor,

   • The name, mailing address and email address of the candidate, and

   • A one-page summary of the significance of the dissertation.

2. An endorsement letter by the department head or a suitable substitute.

3. One copy of the thesis in electronic format

4. A record of publications in conferences and journals of the work reported in the dissertation, along with their citations, if any.

5. A copyright transfer form filled out and signed by the candidate. Please use the Journals form downloadable from http://www.acm.org/publications/copyright_form for this purpose.

Optional

Supporting letters are helpful and a nomination can be supported by a maximum of five supporting letters from individuals who are familiar with the work. Each supporting letter must include the name, contact information, and telephone number of the supporter.

Mode of submission: Nomination material must be submitted electronically (in PDF or Word format) by the thesis advisor (not by the student) to the ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Coordinator at: emily.eng@hq.acm.org. Please write "ACM India Doctoral Dissertation submission for [replace-by-nominee-name]" in the subject line of the email. All nomination material for a nominee must be sent bundled as a zip file in one email. Supporting letters need not come directly from the supporters—all necessary material, including supporting letters, may by collected and submitted by the thesis advisor, bundled as a zip file in one email.

Selection Procedure

Dissertations will be reviewed for technical depth and significance of the research contribution, potential impact on theory and practice, and quality of presentation. A committee of approximately ten eminent Computer Science researchers from across the world will perform an initial screening to generate a short list, followed by an in-depth evaluation to determine the winning dissertation.

For further queries on the ACM India Best Doctoral Dissertation Award, contact acmindiaaward@acm.org

Doctoral Dissertation Award Committee

ACM India is grateful to these 2014 Committee members for their service:

Chair: Anuj Dawar (University of Cambridge, UK)

Members:

• Chandrajit Bajaj (University of Texas at Austin, USA)
• Krishnendu Chakrabarty (Duke University, Durham, NC, USA)
• Subhasis Chaudhuri (Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India)
• Surajit Chaudhuri (Microsoft Research, Redmond, WA, USA)
• Anil Jain (Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA)
• Sanjay Jain (National University of Singapore)
• Niraj Jha (Princeton University, NJ, USA)
• S. Keshav (University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada)
• Manish Parashar (Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ)
• Natarajan Shankar (SRI International, Menlo Park, CA, USA)

ACM-W India

ACM-W India seeks to take forward the task of the ACM community, but with a particular focus on the empowerment of women in computing in India.

ACM-W supports, celebrates, and advocates internationally for the full engagement of women in all aspects of the computing field, providing a wide range of programs and services to ACM members and working in the larger community to advance the contributions of technical women. ACM-W Student Chapters are created to help recruit and retain students in computing programs. Professional Chapter-sponsored activities educate women about careers in computing and provide networking opportunities.

ACM-W India aims to provide social and professional support for women in computing, and its proposed activities include:

• Facilitate technical growth of women by organizing invited lectures, seminars, workshops and informal meetings
• Provide a platform for the sharing of information, resources, ideas and experiences
• Support women in their professional career growth and help them to face the challenges in their work environment
• Encourage them to participate in computer-related studies and research

ACM-W India's goal would be to also promote computer literacy, particularly in rural India, with the objective of empowering underprivileged women and children, to enable them to be independent and self-reliant.

ACM-W India
Chair: Sheila Anand, Rajalakshmi Engineering College, Chennai
Vice Chair: Jayanthi Sivaswamy, International Institute for Information Technology, Hyderabad
Secretary: Maneesha V. Ramesh, Amrita University, Kerala
Treasurer: Ranjani Parthasarathi, Anna University, Chennai
Members:
Sangeeta Bhattacharya, Intel Labs, Bangalore
Gnanapriya C, Infosys Technologies Ltd., Bangalore
Lipika Dey, Tata Consultancy Services, Delhi
Vasundhara Puttagunta, Google, Hyderabad
Gayathri S Raghavan, IBM India - Global Business Services, Chennai
Urvashi Rathod, Symbiosis Centre for Information Technology (SCIT), Pune

ACM-W India news and activities

Contact: acmw_india@acm.org

• Travel Grants for Conferences: ACM India and the Indian Association for Research in Computing Science (IARCS) jointly offer partial travel grants to faculty, students and postdocs from India to present papers co-authored by them at premier international conferences. For more information, please visit the ACM India-IARCS Travel Grants page.
• Read the MemberNet India newsletter of ACM activities and people in India.
• ACM-W India news and activities

Institutional Sponsors

New members from India can join ACM by paying their dues in Indian rupees.

Membership Types: There are two modes of registration: Online or Offline.

Joining ACM Online

There are two types of membership: Student or Professional. Depending upon the type of membership you can click on the relevant links as below.

Student Registration Link | Professional Registration Link

Information on Demand Draft (DD) and NEFT Payments

Demand Draft and NEFT are alternative forms of payment for those not registering online. Click on ACM Membership Payment by DD or NEFT for full instructions.

 

Advanced Member Grades

The ACM India Council is encouraging all eligible ACM members in India to consider applying for advanced member status within ACM. ACM advanced member grades require varying degrees of experience and accomplishment.

For more information on how to nominate someone for these grades, click on these links:

Fellow nominations

Distinguished member nominations

Senior member nominations

Follow the links below for a list of Indians holding advanced ACM member grades:

Indian ACM Fellows