Chavi Singhal
My fascination with computers began when I was around eleven, with a tank-based computer game – “Recoil”. Trying to navigate through the levels of the game kept me engrossed. This, in turn, developed an urge in me to figure out the underlying logics and algorithms of the game. Later on, the rise of the World Wide Web catered to my inquisitiveness: from understanding this sophisticated machine to decoding intricate puzzles. Consequently, I imbibed a deep interest in learning new computer tricks and analytical problem solving. I avidly started following “Shakuntala Devi’s [1] puzzles” that catalyzed my innate love of numbers and logical thinking abilities.
Amazed at finding a strong correlation between computers and logical abilities, I got motivated to perceive my hobby as a career in Computer Science. With sheer determination and hard work, I got into Jaypee Institute of Information Technology, one of the elite Engineering colleges in India. The course structure of the program gave me a wide exposure to the major areas of Computer Science, along with subjects from other disciplines like Project Management, Operational Research and Managerial Economics. In addition, there were professional development activities that aided in my all round development. An urge to excel academically, coupled with the milieu of a competitive peer group resulted in me graduating as a Bachelor of Technology with a top-notch GPA of 8.1 on a scale of 10, amongst the scholar students at my university. I believe that my undergraduate studies have equipped me with both the technical and managerial skills to succeed in future endeavors.
I always had a keen desire to experimentally conform the theoretical aspects of learning. This resulted in several practical projects, notably among which is my work on secure data dissemination, titled Bluetooth Streamer. This was installed as a Campus Notifier at our college and the project remains operational, even after four years of deployment. The project was used to disperse information from an administrator server to all Bluetooth enabled devices, in the immediate vicinity, about various events, guest lectures and community meetings. The use of this service aimed to provide a more cost-effective and faster circulation of data. The project developed in me a deeper understanding of security standards and highlighted the complexities of a live project.
The spellbinding possibilities of web applications prompted me to develop a website called Wildlife Planet. The website was an amalgam of web designing technologies, data mining and natural language processing. The aim was to extract information about different wildlife species and to predict the occurrence of endangered species. This led to an enrichment of my knowledge in data gathering, the process of summarizing the data into meaningful information, and subsequently taking appropriate decisions. My growing interests in data management spurred me on to take up a project on Divination – Predicting the Future, to gain insights into data retrieval in congruence with Image Processing, to correlate human characteristics with the study of palm images laid down by the science of Palmistry. Apart from my academics, I have been designing clothes and always found it captivating; in particular, Indian Ethnic Wear. My good color sense adds adequate value to my hobby.
Three years’ professional experience with Accenture got me acquainted with developing, testing, and managing complex projects for Nordic Bank in risk management and compliance. This exposure laid concrete foundations for data warehousing, mining and visualizations. Strong technical expertise not only helped me cater to the needs of the organization as developer and tester, but also led me to create innovative tools - Automated testing tool, to reduce effective testing time by at least 50% and identify defects early in life cycle. I was recognized with financial award for