A report by TRAI indicates that there are 499 million mobile subscribers in rural India of which, 109 million use smartphones. When it comes to mobile penetration, more than 70% Indians who live in rural India are not far behind their urban counterparts, reveals the report. Keeping this data in mind, The Logical Indian in collaboration with HackerEarth, a startup tech company based in Bengaluru is conducting a rural development hackathon. The hackathon has been curated by HackerEarth to find technical solutions for challenges faced by rural India. in agriculture, education and healthcare with the help of partner NGOs- Teach for India, Sattva Group, I DO, Digital Green, U&I and Nirmaan Organization.
The participants of the hackathon will work on following themes:
1. Education: The students in villages face immense problem due to the lack of quality infrastructure, teachers, and materials. The country faces crisis aplenty with no access to basic education, unqualified and uninterested teaching staff, and outdated teaching methods and curriculum. Solutions are required in this area.
2. Healthcare: There is a considerable disparity between the 1:1000 doctor-population ratio recommended by WHO compared to the current 1:1674 ratio in India. There are additional problems like fewer number of clinics, lack of equipment, superstitious beliefs and unavailability of funds. Solutions in the healthcare sector will enable rural India to avail the medical services that are currently unavailable to them.
3. Agriculture: Solutions are required to solve a range of problems in agriculture including lack of resources, dependence on imports and steep reduction of farmers’ income. For sustainable outcomes, only the smart application of tech and scientific advances can boost rural growth and agricultural productivity.
4. General: Solutions are also sought for issues apart from education, healthcare and agriculture. Participants can identify other problem statements and develop solutions that will support the rural citizens.
Sachin Gupta, CEO and Cofounder, HackerEarth said: “ This move would be a great opportunity for the tech community to build solutions that impact the lives of millions of Indians in the rural areas.”
Registration
The registrations for the hackathon began on December 8th, 2017 and over 1000 participants have already registered. The winning team will be granted INR 50,000 as prize money and the most viable solution will be given a chance to work with the respective NGO for implementation.
The deadline for the submission of ideas for participants/ teams is January 26th, 2018. Shortlisted teams can submit their solutions by February 26th, 2018. To know more about the Rural Development hackathon or to register, please visit hck.re/RuralDevelopmentHack
About HackerEarth
HackerEarth has powered innovation and talent management for large enterprises across major industries such as financial services, retail, healthcare, and manufacturing. HackerEarth empowers businesses to connect with the developer community to crowdsource ideas into real-life products and helps them assess technical talent for hiring.
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