NMIMS Navi Mumbai Students Excel in Smart India Hackathon

In two distinct milestones, students of NMIMS Navi Mumbai’s School of Technology Management and Engineering (STME) showcased innovation and technological expertise and received accolades at the Smart India Hackathon 23 and mIndicator Hackathon held in December 2023 and January 2024 respectively. Mahek Mushrif and Hittanshu Upadyay, second-year computer engineering students, stood third at the M-Indicator Hackathon 2024 held in January 2024; while earlier in December 2023, team ‘Narcotech’ reached the Grand Finale of the Smart India Hackathon 2023.

Mahek and Hittanshu participated in the M-Indicator Hackathon 2024 held at the Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute (VJTI) in Mumbai on the 13th and 14th January 2024. The hackathon was open to both students and working professionals. Mahek and Hittanshu participated in the Android Hackathon round of the competition. It was a 24-hour competition and required participants to develop a working prototype of an Android application for the transportation sector.

The talented students presented their innovative solution, ‘sheRides’, an online ride-sharing platform, exclusively for women. The platform connects female passengers with female drivers, offering economic independence and a safe travel option. ‘sheRides’ aims to empower female drivers, ensure and improve safety for women travellers, and foster a sense of community. For this innovation, Mahek and Hittanshu received the 3rd prize, earning them a certificate and a cash prize. Moreover, they received the opportunity to meet and interact with Mr. Sachin Teke, Founder of M-indicator.

Earlier in December 2023, STME’s Team Narcotech featured in the Grand Finale round of All India Council for Technical Education’s (AICTE) Smart India Hackathon 2023, a national-level competition held for young innovators. Mentored by Dr. Yogesh Jadhav Assistant Professor, the team featured Mahek Mushrif, Bhavya Chopra, Reyansh Gupta, Hittanshu Upadyay, Om Sawant and Bhoomi Nelwade. Held on 20 December 2023, the Grand Finale stage required the participants to work on a problem statement provided by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, which was Smart and effective real-time management of street parking.

The talented team came up with ‘pARkit’, an innovative solution, which employs Augmented Reality (AR) along with Machine Learning (ML) to guide drivers to find and navigate to parking spots near them. The innovative mobile application leverages AR to guide users to real-time parking spots using their phone cameras.

‘pARkit’ comes with a smart Dynamic Pricing System driven by a ML algorithm, which ensures fair pricing based on factors like day, time, proximity to amenities, distance from amenities and handicap accessibility. The key strength of pARkit lies in its cloud-based architecture, making it highly scalable and efficient.

The team presented a working business model of pARkit in front of a panel of esteemed judges which consisted of Product Managers from top companies such as Wipro as well as owners of US-based start-ups.

Appreciating the efforts of the students, Prof. Aditya Kasar, Program Chairperson-STME, NMIMS Navi Mumbai STME, said, “At NMIMS STME we strive to foster innovation among our students and welcome the remarkable achievements at the Smart India Hackathon 2023 and the M-indicator Hackathon 2024. The achievements are a source of inspiration to the other students and a matter of pride for all of us.”