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Winner of Water Challenge Hackathon

A Water challenge was launched by Smart City Living Lab, IIITH in association with Government of Telangana & NIUM during February – March 2021 to find viable solutions to the water problems like quality, supply and non-revenue water by the cities. The panelists were from Academia (IIITH), Government bodies (MEITY, HMWSSB, NIUM), private consultants from WRI, and technology partners EBTC.

Out of 20 teams from different backgrounds like start-ups and educational institutions, 4 teams shortlisted for the final round which was conducted at Smart City Living Lab. Out of 4 teams, IIITH students – Rishikesh Bose, MS 1st year;  Ayush Kumar Lall, 3rd year Dual Degree; Nilesh Bawankar, MS 1st year and Ansh Khandelwal, 3rd Year BTech Honors were declared as the winner of the water challenge hackathon. The team was led by Dr. Dr. Sachin Chaudhari on the theme low cost retrofit for digitization of analog water meter, a viable replacement of expensive digital water meters.

IIIT team members had to develop feasible solutions for cities in the areas of non-revenue water (water revenue lost due to unaccounted water, pipe-breakage or lost in tanks or in pilferage, etc.), water quality and quantity monitoring, wastewater industrial/sewerage etc and rain-water, water drains and open innovation. IIITH team’s solution was a Retrofit node for smart water meter.

The winning team has been given an opportunity to do a PoC in one of the districts in Telangana which will be supported by NIUM and HMDA.