AHMEDABAD: An Australia-based NRI, Bharat Dave, had donated his collection of over 400 books to his almamater CEPT thorough his last will and testament. Dave, a professor in Melbourne University, had died in 2014 due to cancer and had expressed in his will that he wanted pay back his almamater by donating all his books.
On Monday, a lecture series titled 'Between Technology and Tradition' was held in the memory of Dave at the Cept university. The function was funded by the Australian government.
According to Cept officials, Dave's wife, Mala Dave, and his friend Paolo Tombessi, had arranged to ship Dave's books from Melbourne to the city. Dave had studied in Cept from 1973 to 1980 and later he did his doctorate from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. He had then started teaching as faculty of architecture at Melbourne University in Australia.
Snehal Shah, visiting professor and director of library at Cept, said that Dave had not put any names on the books. "Once the books were donated to CEPT, they merged with other books and people cannot identify which books belonged to him."
"His family had sent all the books from Australia at their own expense, and the books had reached the university campus in October 2016," Shah added.