PM Modi to address grand finale of Smart India Hackathon on August 1

New Delhi, July 27: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the grand finale of Smart India Hackathon on August 1 during which over 10,000 students will compete to solve 243 problem statements from government departments and industries, Union HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' announced on Monday.

The HRD minister chaired a high-level meeting to give final shape to the plan for the finale of the hackathon event scheduled from August 1-3. Smart India Hackathon is an initiative to identify new and disruptive digital technology innovations for solving the challenges faced by our country.

"Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the grand finale of the largest ever online hackathon in the world from 7 pm onwards on August 1 through video-conference. Considering the COVID-19 pandemic, the finale shall be organised online by connecting all the participants throughout the nation together over a specially built advanced platform," Nishank said.

"This year, we will have more than 10,000 students competing to solve 243 problem statements from 37 central government departments, 17 state governments and 20 industries. Each problem statement carries a prize money of Rs 1 lakh except the student innovation theme which will have three winners, 1st, 2nd and 3rd, with prize money of Rs 1 lakh, Rs 75,000 and Rs 50,000 respectively," he added.

Hackathon is a non-stop digital product development competition, where problems are posed to technology students to suggest innovative solutions.

"Students would have the opportunity to work on challenges faced by government departments and private sector organisations for which they can offer outside-the-box and world-class solutions," a senior HRD Ministry official said.

"The first level screening of students' ideas has already taken place in January through a college level hackathon and only the winning teams at the college level were made eligible for the national round. Again at national level, ideas were screened by experts and evaluators and only the shortlisted teams will compete in the grand finale," he added.

This is the fourth edition of the hackathon organised by HRD Ministry. "As outcome of Smart India Hackathons till date, around 331 prototypes have been developed, 71 start-ups are under formation, 19 start-ups are successfully registered.

Further, 39 solutions have already been deployed at various departments, and around 64 potential solutions have been funded for further development," the official said.