Obituary: RN Vakil, an educationist with a ‘humanistic’ approach

He is survived by two sons Rahul, Madhav and wife Meeta. While Cept alumni paid rich tributes to their former director on social media, the varsity announced his death on their portal. An eminent structural engineer with a deeply spiritual side, a humanist, a leader who moulded an architecture school under whose reign a new course was introduced every two months, an urban developer who worked for the marginalised — RN Vakil donned many hats. Noted architect and academician with Cept Neelkanth Chhaya describes him as ‘curious’ and ‘active’ person who was interested in many things.

Chhaya said, “He had very advanced ideas on education and not interested in the bureaucratization of it. He used to constantly impress the importance of human values and was concerned that students develop not just as professionals but also as human beings. He had an ability to listen to others and led CEPT without applying undue pressure on anyone and allowed a lot of initiatives to flourish on campus. Being a structural engineer, he was curious about things like ethics, philosophy and aspects which an engineer should know of.”

Notable among his work is urban renewal projects through resettlement and development of slums in Juhapura in Ahmedabad through (Ahmedabad Study Action group (ASAG). Architect and founder of ASAG Kirtee Shah called Vakil ‘a humanist’ and a leader who pushed others to frontiers and himself ‘shunned the centrestage’.

Shah said, “Having known him closely for the last 40 years I consider him my Guru. Few people knew that he was a deeply spiritual person and was deeply interested in the meaning of life. He was an educationist of a different kind who believed in liberating education without boundaries of disciplines. While starting ASAG, we decided that unlike conventional architects, we will work for the poor. One of our projects today regarded as iconic was creating housing for 2,500 slum dwellers of Juhapura. In the last 10-15 years of his life, he was involved in conducting research and human development among our projects and in his demise we have lost an incredible thinker.”

Cept’s Centre of Excellence in Urban Transport Director Shivanand Swamy said that on the varsity’s behalf Vakil had led a team of 100 structural engineers who did the post earthquake seismic assessment of buildings and supported the city in issuing certificates to buildings in 2001.

“People who wanted to initiate anything could go to him on campus and very rarely he said no. He would encourage people to take up activities and would be supportive. All the projects that we talk about today be it BRTS or other projects were initiated in his time and he was also member of the Sabarmati Riverfront Development Corporation Ltd (SRFDCL).He had a lot of interest in science and education, dream to bring back focus on pure science and primary level education,” said Swamy.