PROFILE
And You ARE? Anil Gupta, P.Eng., FEC., FGC (Hon.) History Buff • World Traveller • Board of Examiners Volunteer
BY CORINNE LUTTER Member & Internal Communications Coordinator
Throughout his career, chemical engineer Anil Gupta, P.Eng., FEC, FGC (Hon.), has used the latest technol- ogy to design and build oil and gas refineries around the globe. When he heads out on vacation, though, he likes to discover things that aren’t quite that new. It’s ancient technology and past civilizations that grab his attention. The history buff is likely to be found visiting archeological sites and museums — even though a trip to Disneyland is not out of the question. “I like travelling to see new places and visiting museums to see the history and art. It’s very inspiring for me to see how people worked and lived in the past,” explains Mr. Gupta, a longtime APEGA volunteer who serves on APEGA’s Board of Examiners as well as the Calgary Branch Executive. On a recent holiday to southern India, Mr. Gupta visited ancient temples. One of his favourites was the Brihadeeshwara Temple of Tanjore, which dates from around 1010 AD. Not only are the temple’s elaborate stone carvings fascinating works of art, but the struc- ture itself is an engineering marvel of interlocking stones without binding material. Whether he’s admiring the Mona Lisa at the Louvre in France, checking out Scythian antiquities at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia, discovering Michelangelo sculptures at the Vatican, or learning about pioneer life in Canada at the Glenmore Museum in Calgary, this APEGA volunteer is captivated by the stories and secrets of bygone eras. Just how did they build those colossal pyramids in Egypt, anyway? “It’s amazing – but a mystery — how they built the pyramids when there were no cranes and no other heavy lifting equipment,” says Mr. Gupta, who visited Egypt and several Mediterranean countries in 1988.
left home to study at the Indian Institute of Technology. After graduating, he started a four-decade-and-count- ing career by working for a large engineering, procure- ment, and construction (EPC) company specializing in oil refineries and gas plants. After working there several years, he and his family moved to Kuwait, where all told he spent 16 years, spending his work hours designing and building refineries for the Kuwait National Petroleum Company (with a short two-year stint in Japan). And then, in 1990, life took an unexpected turn: Iraq invaded Kuwait. Mr. Gupta was on a business trip to Japan when Kuwait was attacked. It was fortunate, too, that his wife and two young children were safe in India at the time. “So I returned to India in limbo,” he recalls. “I enjoyed the first two months of nothing to do, but YESTERDAY Anil Gupta, P.Eng., on his first trip to Canada in 1990, inside a Shell airplane on his way to visit the company’s Waterton gas plant near Pincher Creek. He enjoyed Calgary so much that he decided to move there. -photo courtesy Anil Gupta, P.Eng., FEC, FGC (Hon.)
AN APTITUDE FOR ENGINEERING
Growing up in the city of Muzaffarnagar, India, a teenaged Anil was more interested in math and science — physics and chemistry in particular — than history. A high school aptitude test steered him towards engi- neering, so that’s what he decided to major in when he
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