A Brief Report on 6th International Conference on Recent Advances in Geotechnical Earthquake

Engineering and Soil Dynamics (6ICRAGEE)

August 03-06, 2016, IIT Roorkee Extension Centre, 20 Knowledge Park II Greater Noida, India

The 6th International Conference on Recent Advances in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering and
Soil Dynamics (6ICRAGEE) was held at IIT Roorkee Extension Centre, 20 Knowledge Park II,
Greater Noida, India during August 03-06, 2016. The Conference was organized by the Indian Society of
Earthquake Technology (ISET) and the Department of Earthquake Engineering, IIT Roorkee in
cooperation with the Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla, USA and CSIR-Central
Building Research Institute, Roorkee.
Dr. Ajay Chourasia, Conference Organizing Secretary extended a warm welcome to the delegates, the
Chief Guest Prof. Richard D. Woods, University of Michigan, USA and the Guest of Honour Prof. P.K.
Ghosh, Dy. Director, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee. Welcome addresses were delivered by
Prof. H.R. Wason, Conference Chairman and Prof. Shamsher Prakash, Honorary Distinguished Co-
Chair. Prof. M.L. Sharma, President ISET & Co-Chair 6ICRAGEE and Prof. Y. Singh, Head of the
Earthquake Eng. Dept. IIT Roorkee & Co-Chair 6ICRAGEE delivered their addresses at the Inaugural
Function. The Conference was inaugurated by Prof. Richard D. Woods, and Prof. P.K. Ghosh presided
over the Inaugural Function.
During the Opening Ceremony, two awards were also presented, namely, S.P. Foundation Life Time
Achievement Award to Prof. R.D. Woods, University of Michigan, USA and ISET S.P. Award for
Significant Contribution in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering to Prof. Ricardo Dobry,
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, USA.

Dr. Ajay Chourasia, Organizing Secretary 6ICRAGEE Prof. Shamsher Prakash, Honorary Distinguished Co-
and Secretary ISET welcoming the Chief Guest, Guest of Chair, 6ICRAGEE delivering the Welcome Address at
Honour and other Guests to the Conference the Inaugural Function

Prof. M.L. Sharma, President, ISET & Co-Chair, Prof. Y. Singh, Head of the Earthquake Eng. Dept. &
6ICRAGEE delivering his Address at the Inaugural Co-Chair, 6ICRAGEE delivering his Address at the
Function Inaugural Function
Chief Guest Prof. R.D. Woods receiving S.P. Foundation Prof. Ricardo Dobry receiving ISET S.P. Award for
Life Time Achievement Award from Prof. P.K. Ghosh Significant Contribution in Geotech. Earthquake Eng.
from Prof. M.L. Sharma

Chief Guest Prof. R.D. Woods delivering the Inaugural Prof. H.R. Wason, Chairman 6ICRAGEE presenting a
Address Memento to the SOAP Speaker Dr. N.
Gopalakrishnan, Director, CSIR-CBRI, Roorkee

Prof. R.D. Woods delivering the SOAP Lecture Prof. Ricardo Dobry delivering the SOAP Lecture
 A Technical Session in Progress Valedictory function in Progrees

This Conference was a successful event in which 20 International delegates, 58 Indian delegates and 15
Sponsor/Co-Sponsor delegates participated. Nineteen eminent internationally renowned personalities
from different Universities/Organizations including Prof. Richard D. Woods, University of Michigan,
USA; Prof. Ricardo Dobry, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, USA; Prof. Pedro Pinto, Laboratorio
Nacionel de Eng. Civil, Lisboa, Portugal; Prof. Shamsher Prakash, MST, Rolla, USA; Prof. Vijay K. Puri,
SIUC, Carbondale; Prof. Ikuo Towhata, University of Tokyo, Japan; Prof. Ahmed Elgamal, University of
California, USA; Prof. Amir M. Kaynia, NGI, Norway; Prof. Gopal S.P. Madabhushi, University of
Cambridge, U.K.; Prof. Jorge F. Meneses, Group Delta Consultants Inc., California, USA; Prof. Mahesh
Tandon, Tandon Consultants, New Delhi, and Prof. N. Gopalakrishnan, Director, CSIR-CBRI, Roorkee
delivered their State-Of-Art-and-Practices and Special Presentation Lectures in the field of Geotechnical
Earthquake Engineering. Other invited presentations were made by Prof. K.S. Rao, IIT Delhi; Prof H.R.
Wason, IIT Roorkee; Prof. M.L. Sharma, IIT Roorkee; Prof. T.G. Sitharam, IISc Bangalore; Prof.
Deepankar Choudhury, IIT Bombay; Prof. B.K. Maheshwari, IIT Roorkee and Prof. G.V. Ramana, IIT
Delhi. Keynote Lecture by Prof. George Gazetas was screened through Video, PPT presentation.

The technical proceedings of the Conference were organized in Five Technical Sessions spread over three
days. A total of 42 technical presentations were made covering eight themes. The resolutions adopted
unanimously during the valedictory function of the Conference are as under:
The state of the art practices presented by engineers and scientists during the 6ICRAGEE has
amply emphasised the need of development of national facility for carrying out geotechnical
earthquake engineering investigations. In this regard, the guidelines to carry out such
investigations be taken up at codal provision level.
It was unanimously resolved to include the geotechnical earthquake engineering education at the
undergraduate level in the state level and regional engineering colleges to civil engineering
students along with capacity building programs such as training of trainers.
The unplanned development in the fast growing urban areas was one of the main concerns of the
participants and it was resolved that seismic microzonation of the areas above some threshold
population level be taken up by the concerned government/ministries/organisations.

HP India Sales Pvt. Ltd., Gurgaon was the Gold Sponsor of the Conference. SERB, DST, New Delhi;
AERB, Mumbai; INSA, New Delhi; AIMIL, New Delhi; Trimble; Complete Instrumentation Solutions
Pvt. Ltd., Gurgaon, and Keller Ground Engineering India Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai were the Sponsors of the
Conference. Ram Caddsys Pvt. Ltd., Chennai, and Pinnacle Geosystems, Delhi were the Co-sponsors of
the Conference. An exhibition of some Geotechnical instrumentation, Softwares and earthquake recording
instruments was displayed by Sponsors and Co-sponsors.