Cassette player, telephone buried in time capsule at Science Congress

A cassette player, a laptop, a handycam, a drone among others have been sealed in a metal and glass “time capsule” and buried 10 feet deep at the campus of Lovely Professional University.

A cassette player, a laptop, a handycam, a drone and a hard-disk with popular films like the Hritik Roshan starrer Krrish, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator among others, have been sealed in a metal and glass “time capsule” and buried 10 feet deep at the campus of Lovely Professional University on the sidelines of the ongoing 106th Indian Science Congress that was inaugurated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday.

A cassette player, a laptop, a handycam, a drone among others have been sealed in a metal and glass “time capsule” and buried 10 feet deep at the campus of Lovely Professional University on the sidelines of the Indian Science Congress. (HT PHOTO)

Among the 100 odd items contained within the elevator-like box, which is to be opened on January 3, 2119, were also replicas of Indian Space Research Organisation’s Mangalyaan, the BrahMos missile, the Tejas fighter jet and a fixedline telephone. Also included are a virtual reality glass, induction cooktop, and an air purifier inside along with seeds of tomato and a few other vegetables.

The box was interred by two Nobel Laureates who were present at the event – Professor Avram Hershko and Professor Duncan Haldane.

“Earlier, major developments would take place over a few decades while today new tech capabilities are being added to our lives every few years. The time capsule developed by us offers a representation of our technological knowhow as it stands today,” said LPU Chancellor Ashok Mittal.

Former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had also buried a time capsule called ‘Kaalpaatra’ near the Red Fort complex on August 15, 1972, to mark 25 years of Independence. Though it was to remain undisturbed for 1,000 years, it was dug up by the Janta party government. The contents, however, were never made public.

Another time capsule was buried by the then-President Pratibha Patil at IIT Kanpur in 2010.

“No one knows what would be the impact of such an activity. They have buried some things but the pace at which the technology is moving, we do not even know whether the people would be able to read the data contained on these devices. What if the data storage unit then is the DNA?” said Prof Premendu Mathur, general secretary, Indian Science Congress Association and head of department of biochemistry and molecular biology at Pondicherry University.