Gov-Tech-Thon 2020, a 36 hours, pan-India virtual hackathon received registrations from over 1,300 aspirants forming 390 teams. 

 

The hackathon was organized by IEEE, National Informatics Centre (NIC) and Oracle, under the aegis of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India. 

 

The shortlisted 447 enthusiasts from 100 teams participated in the hackathon on the five problem statements provided by 3 central Government Ministries – Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare; Ministry of Road Transport and Highways; and Ministry of Education.

 

The five challenges seeking innovative solutions from Gov-Tech-Thon 2020 were: Suggest alternate crops or crop rotation for farmers during different seasons using AI (artificial intelligence) considering the terrain and local challenges to increase productivity; Addressing issues of poor seed quality effectively by tracing the seeds using blockchain; Mobile/web based application for scanning, resizing and uploading documents in a single flow; Tool for monitoring online exams from homes/institutions through a combination of remote-supervision software and web cam ensuring necessary authentication, control, fraud detection and compliance, using appropriate technologies like AI/ML etc.; and Self-learning tools for automating vehicle fitness test procedures transparently. 

 

First place was secured by the FitForFuture team from Robert Bosch Engineering and Business Solutions Private Limited for demonstrating an innovative solution prototype for automating vehicle fitness checks. 

 

The second prize went to HackDemons of Indian Institute of Information Technology Vadodara for providing a secure solution for delivering unsupervised tests remotely and Orange team from PES University Bengaluru secured third prize for providing a unique solution for seed certification using Blockchain technology.

 

Dr. Neeta Verma, Director General, NIC said, "These virtual hackathons displayed a unique combination of social sector and emerging technologies. The hackathon has enabled the use of emerging technologies for social inclusion, empowerment of people and overall upliftment of the nation." 

 

Melissa Russel, Executive Director, Computer Society said, “We were so pleased to partner with NIC and Oracle for this event. The IEEE Computer Society has a strong membership base in India and opportunities like Gov-Tech-Thon provide valuable ways for professionals to engage, network and utilize their skills to help solve challenging problems.”

 

Shailender Kumar, Regional Managing Director, Oracle India said, “It was a great collaboration, and a great platform to seed innovation ideas. I was very fascinated with the prototype solutions that were submitted and it gives me an immense sense of pride to see our youth contributing to a better tomorrow.”