The nation-wide Grand Finale of the second part of the Smart India Hackathon-2019 (Hardware Edition) began on Monday at 18 centres across the length and breadth of the country including India with enthusiastic participation from women students.
Around 2,000 students grouped into 250 teams from 178 colleges including IITs and NITs are participating. Of them, 1,230 were men and 770 women, making it a ratio of 1.6:1. The teams will provide innovative hardware solutions for 124 problems. The problems have been selected from areas such as agriculture and rural development, food technology, waste management, clean water, renewable energy, healthcare and biomedical devices, smart vehicles, robotics and drones, security and surveillance, smart communication, sports and fitness, sustainable environment, smart textile, and smart cities.
While inaugurating the event, Union Minister for Human Resource Development, Ramesh Pokhriyal said that Smart India Hackathon - 2019 was a right platform where student innovators can develop smart solution to day to day problems. He said that through research, innovation and appropriate use of technology India can become a highly advanced, developed and prosperous nation.
Ramesh Pokhriyal said " Through research, innovation and appropriate use of technology India can become a highly advanced, developed and prosperous nation."
Noting that it was the third consecutive year of Smart India Hackathon, he said it was world’s largest open hackathon and was growing each year in terms of participation and solutions. He congratulated the participating students and officials of Ministry of Human Resource Development and All India Council for Technical Education for the initiative aimed at betterment of the country.
Speaking on the occasion, Union Minister of State for Human Resource Development, Sanjay Dhotre expressed confidence that during the Hackathon, the students will bring out technology based easy workable solutions to the various problems facing the country and lead to commercial products to develop start-ups.
The Smart India Hackathon started two years back with participation of around 50,000 students. Last year, it went up to around one lakh students. This year, it has grown bigger with two lakh students participating.
Head of Design Innovation Centre, IIT Delhi, Prof PVM Rao and Hackathon Coordinator for IIT Delhi, Prof Srinivasan Venkataraman were also present. The first part of Smart India Hackathon 2019, (Software Edition) was conducted earlier this year on March 2 and 3.
India Science Wire
