Students' resolve for nation-building is India's identity now, says PM Modi at Smart India Hackathon final

Mysuru: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday expressed happiness over the contribution of foreign students in the growth and development of India.

Modi was virtually interacting with students and participants at the Mysuru-based National Institute of Engineering (NIE), as part of the nationwide Smart India Hackathon (SIH).

Modi said, he usually tries to interact with the students participating in the SIH, as he can learn a lot of things from the efforts of the students, to innovate useful things for the nation. “The resolve of the students for nation-building has become the identity of India,” he said.

Soikat Das from Bangladesh, a student of National Institute of Technology, Trichy, Tamil Nadu, explained about their project, using IoT and AI (internet of things and artificial intelligence) for optimal loading of cargo, including coal, in railway wagons. The team from NIT consists of three Bangladesh and three Indian students. Das led the team. Karthik Narayanan also spoke to Modi, along with Das. Their project is named ‘Prevention of underloading and overloading of railway wagons’.

Das explained, if the wagons are overloaded, a fine is imposed, and if it is not filled to the optimum level, there will be a transportation loss. He said, 3D scanning of the wagon and its content is also done to predict the weight of the commodity.

Modi said, the innovation will help the nation to use the available resources judiciously. He appealed to foreign students, to make use of the Study in India scheme and be part of the development of India.

SIH is an initiative by the Union Education Ministry’s Innovation Cell to provide students a platform to solve the problems of the government, ministries, departments, industries and other organisations. SIH was organised by the Innovation Cell, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and i4c from December 19 to 23.

Besides NIE, Gujarat Technological University of Ahmedabad; Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology, Sambalpur, Odisha; Assam Royal Global University, Guwahati, Assam; and Noida Institute of Engineering and Technology, Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh were selected for interaction with the PM. NIE has been selected as a nodal centre to host the event in hardware category.