The ultimate public transportation mobile application for commuters in Chennai

Most of the IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) graduates (if not all) proceed to USA for higher studies and job, as USA is a land of opportunities.

But we must congratulate and thank the three IIT Graduates, namely (i) Mr Siddharth Krishnaswamy, (ii) Mr Akilesh Koppineni and (iii) Mr Krishna Chaitanya who decided to team up to have a start-up with a view to showcasing their love for the City of Chennai. .

Thus, we the Chennai residents should be more grateful to these Graduates, as their dream project is benefitting us in a big way.   Raft – A public transport mobile application, which launched recently, is the outcome of their hard work out of an office space at the IIT Madras Research Park.  The app has more than 50,000+ downloads already.   The App gives the user the best routes to take between any two points in the city, using up-to-date timings of buses and trains

Covers all modes of public transportation options including MTC buses, Local trains, MRTS.  For now, the three are waiting for the Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) to start operations.  If we go by the news item recently on TV Channels, the Chennai Metro rail is scheduled to start its operations in Chennai on 10 July 2015 and thus the Raft will be updated to include Metro rail timings, as well.

According to the Graduates, efforts are on to branch out to other cities. We wish them a huge success with their efforts.

It was unfortunate that IIT-M (Indian Institute of Technology, Madras) was in the news in connection with Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle – the student body that was suspended on 22 May 2015.  Fortunately, the problem is sorted out with IIT-M lifting the ban on 8 June 2015.  However, there was a lot of tension, anxiety which I am sure would have affected to a certain extent the academic and research activities at IIT-M.  I personally feel Politicians should keep themselves off from academic institutions in general and premier institutions like IIT in particular and allow them to continue to carry out their teaching and research activities without any hindrance.  At least in future, let the Politicians leave it to the Institution and students themselves to sort out the differences, if any.

The outcome of the dream project by the three IITM Graduates is a classic example of the transfer of their knowledge leading to the mobile application, which is hugely benefitting the commuters in Chennai.