Students tasked with finding solutions to problems that government departments face

NEW DELHI: From identifying "potential" breaking news based on social media chatter to recognise birds by the sound they make-researchers and innovators from across the country have been tasked with finding solutions to hundreds of problems for which ministries and states need solutions.

An initiative by the Human Resources Development ministry to find digital solutions for various issues faced by the ministries, departments and states has seen technology enthusiasts taking up hundreds of projects to find easy software solutions.

The initiative, Smart India Hackathon 2018, in which about one lakh engineering and management students had initially participated, has now reached its final stage and on March 30 and 31 best innovators will be chosen for a Rs 1 lakh cash award followed by two runner-ups.

The project saw about 1200 problem statements posed by several ministries, state government and other agencies for which they wanted quick fixes.

Information and broadcasting ministry, for instance, has asked for a tool that helps it in identifying “potential” breaking news based on social media chatter and sophisticated sentiment analysis using social media for a particular programme among other things.

The ministry of social justice and empowerment wants separate software that can be used in ATMs so that intellectually less capable people can also use it and the HRD ministry needs a tool that helps students in bettering their mental health.

Similarly, the ministry of environment, forest and climate change wants to develop an automatic instrument to record call of specific birds and weather parameters in a location and real time recording and monitoring of human activities in protected areas.

It has also asked for a tool that helps in identifying poaching and related activities in a certain area.

Ministry of railways, on the other hand, has asked for an improved public address system and a tool to involve passengers in station upkeep.

States have placed in their demands too. Tamil Nadu, for example, wants a dashboard that has medical records of all patients, while Telangana needs an Intelligent Traffic Management System.

Which department/ state wants what

I & B ministry-------------------Identifying breaking news based on social media chatter

Social justice ministry--------Separate ATM software for people with lesser intellectual capacity

Tribal Affairs ministry--- ----Tool for ST parents to locate schools for their children

Punjab government---------Theft detectors in ATMs

Tamil Nadu government-----Dashboard for case history of all patients