India Inc may seek tech solutions at Hackathon 2019

The Centre will invite India Inc to submit problems requiring technical solutions at the next mega software and hardware innovation contest for engineering students in February 2019.

Titled Smart India Hackathon-2019, Human Resource Development (HRD) minister Prakash Javadekar on Wednesday announced the schedules.

“In September (this year), we will seek problem statements from various Union ministries and the State governments. For the first time, we will also be asking industry sector to submit their problems at the upcoming third edition of the Hackathon," Javadekar told reporters.

Registration of engineering students for the contest will start in October, he added.

About one lakh students had participated in the last Smart India Hackathon held under the aegis of HRD ministry.

After the 36-hour, non-stop contest in February this year, 27 innovative computer applications developed by the winner teams were accepted by the government for their further development and deployment.

These innovative solutions included one for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to help prevent theft of sensitive data from its establishments.

“This is real education as the students participating in the Hackathon get three months' hands-on training. We are hoping that 1.5 lakh students from various engineering colleges will participate in the contest to be held in February 2019,” Javadekar said.

The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), Persistent Systems and i4c have joined hands to organise the Smart India Hackathon.

Meant for students

“It is exciting that the world’s biggest open innovation model—Smart India Hackathon 2019—will also involve our win-win collaboration with all the private sector organisations. We hope all technical students make the best of this unique opportunity and make the contest a grand success.” HRD ministry's higher education department secretary R Subrahmanyam said.