Mahindra kicks off 13th edition of Baja Saeindia 2020   

Indore: SAEINDIA, a professional Society of Automotive Engineers, in association with Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd and other sponsors, today announced the commencement of the 13th edition of the much-awaited BAJA SAEINDIA series with 253 teams participating in Pithampur and Chandigarh. 120 mBAJA teams and 53 eBAJA teams in Pithampur and have been selected to make their buggies and participate in the event. The Pithampur event will be inaugurated on January 23, 2020, at the NATRAX site of NATRiP, and the grand finale will be held on January 26, 2020. It will be followed by HR round on 27th & 28th January 2020. The 2nd part of the 13th edition of BAJA SAEINDIA 2020 will be held at Chitkara University near Chandigarh from March 6 to March 8, 2020, where 80 mBAJA teams will participate.

Eight colleges from Indore are among the 15 entries from Madhya Pradesh that have qualified to the finale. For the last few editions of the BAJA series, the maximum number of entries from Madhya Pradesh has been from the city of Indore. Colleges from Indore have won more awards in the finale in the last few years.

Like every year, Indore is hosting over thousands of students at NATRAX, a NATRIP facility, who will collectively work towards making BAJA SAEINDIA 2020 a success. A remarkable feature unique to BAJA SAEINDIA is the adoption of a new theme every year. This year, the theme for BAJA 2020 is 'Breaking Conventions,' which celebrates BAJA, which is all about challenging conventions, say it eBAJA or an all-girls team.

BAJA SAEINDIA tasks the students to conceptualize, design, build, test & validate a single-seater four-wheeled All-Terrain Vehicle (ATV) to take part in a series of events spread across a course of four days. The event will include Technical Inspection, Static Evaluation such as Design, Cost & Sales Presentation, and Dynamic Events such as Acceleration, Sledge Pull, Manoeuvrability, Suspension & Traction followed by an Endurance event of 4 hours.

Mahesh Babu, CEO, Mahindra Electric said, “BAJA SAEINDIA is a talent mine for automotive engineering. With the new disruptions in automotive and technology world, we hope to support these bright engineers of tomorrow. It is extremely encouraging to note how electric mobility is being embraced at this forum with eBaja. As we witness the rise of electric mobility, we look forward to seeing these engineers shape a brighter future for the entire industry.”
 
Dr. Bala Bharadvaj, President, SAEINDIA, and MD, Boeing India, looked at BAJA as the flagship event of SAEINDIA and said, "The BAJA provides a platform for the overall development of an engineering student. This competition enables our budding engineers to grapple with real-life applications and improve their skills related to design, analysis & problem solving besides enhancing their interpersonal skills and self-confidence".

Speaking on occasion, Mr. S. Balraj, Convener, BAJA SAEINDIA 2020 said, "Through this event, BAJA SAEINDIA is transforming lives of many passionate students who are ambitious & talented enough to do great things in their lives. BAJA SAEINDIA has developed to be a much-awaited event across the country for budding engineers, and we are hopeful, like every year, this year too, the teams would perform to best of their abilities."

BAJA SAEINDIA initiated the eBAJA series in 2015, to leverage the onset of Electric Mobility in India. The conventional BAJA vehicles run on 10 HP Briggs & Stratton gasoline engine, common for all Baja teams, whereas eBAJA vehicles run on the electric motor with 6 kW peak electric power, powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery pack. Here, the students are free to source the motor, controller & battery and design their own BMS (Battery Management System). This year, we have encouraged more students from the Electrical & Electronic engineering field to participate in the event, considering the requirements of Human Resource for Electric Vehicles Mobility in the Indian Industry.

For the BAJA finale, entries from engineering colleges from across the country were screened at the Virtual Round held at Chitkara University, Chandigarh in July 2019, where they presented their designs for the BAJA Buggy vehicle that they wished to design for the final event. The qualifying teams were selected through a thorough analysis of their CAD Designs, CAE analysis, DFMEA, DVP, and the designs of Roll Cage, Suspension, Steering & Brakes, along with an online test to evaluate their Baja Rulebook awareness and technical knowledge. The entries presented at the virtual BAJA were mock-ups that would be created with exact specifications by the participants. The teams in the final round would now showcase their skills, understanding, and passion for automobiles while having manufactured their buggy race car.

In India, the BAJA SAEINDIA (Society of Automotive Engineers) began its journey in the year 2007 and was launched under the leadership of Dr. Pawan Goenka (during his tenure as SAEINDIA President) and the convenorship of Dr. K.C. Vora.  As SAEINDIA ventured on to the unchartered territory of holding a mega-event of this scale, NATRiP came forward to lend a helping hand through an earmarked zone at its proving grounds- NATRAX, situated at Pithampur, Indore. Similarly, IIT Ropar came forward to organize the first two events at Punjab, followed by Chitkara University, which will host Baja for the next three years.