The BTech students of the Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore, have put up a stellar performance at 36-hour-long Smart India Hackathon (SIH) 2018 by winning the top prize for developing innovative digital solutions for 340 problems posted by 28 Union Ministries and 18 State Governments held from March 30-31, 2018.

Inaugurated by Union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar, SIH is the largest hackathon in the world and it is in line with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of ‘New India’ to empower and leverage youth. With the participation of over one-lakh students in 12000-plus teams, the top 5% teams were selected for the grand finale being held in 28 centres all over India.

Two teams from the Coimbatore campus namely Team Vision and Team Cyber_Cena won the cash award of Rs. 1 lakh each at SIH 2018.

The team Vision developed an app for ‘export cost indicator’ and ‘trade route map indicator’ at Mumbai for the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. While the team Cyber_Cena developed an app for whitelisting of USB devices which can be subsequently used on the Internet as well as on Intranet at Bengaluru for the Ministry of Defence.

Another team from Amrita, Exalt, won a special award and cash prize of Rs. 1 lakh in the Students’ Innovation category from Ministry of AYUSH for developing an app for Ayurveda unit conversions.

“I am really proud of our students’ achievements at the national stage. A true reflection of the character of Amrita, where we believe in our students, nurture and encourage them to pursue their passion. Winner’s list spans from the first year to third year students, sending a strong message to everyone – Believe in us (the youth) and we (the youth) will take India to greater heights,” shared Dr. Sasangan Ramanathan, Dean, Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore campus.

Three more teams from Amrita were featured in the top 10 teams in India for various ministries. This is the second successive year of the university participating in SIH.

In 2017, Amrita team won the Deloitte Innovation award. Twenty-seven innovations and apps developed in SIH 2017 are being deployed in various ministries. It is expected that over 100 innovations and apps from the SIH 2018 edition will be deployed.