Eight social innovators were awarded INR 2 Crore for groundbreaking innovations in healthcare, education, and women empowerment.
BENGALURU: Infosys Foundation, the philanthropic and CSR arm of Infosys, today announced the winners of the third edition of the Aarohan Social Innovation Awards. These awards, established in 2018, aim to recognize and reward individuals, teams, and NGOs for creating pathbreaking solutions for social good, benefiting the underprivileged in India.
This year, Infosys Foundation recognized winners across three categories: Healthcare, Education, and Women Empowerment. The winners were shortlisted from a pool of over 2,400submissions and evaluated by an esteemed jury comprising:
- Padma Shri Mr. Arvind Gupta, an Indian toy inventor and science expert
- Dr. Pratima Murthy, Director and Head of the Department of Psychiatry, NIMHANS
- Ms. Sairee Chahal, serial entrepreneur, angel investor, and Founder of SHEROES and Mahila Money
- Mr. Sumit Virmani, Trustee, Infosys Foundation
- Mr. Sunil Kumar Dhareshwar, Trustee, Infosys Foundation
Awarded INR 50 lakh each in prize money, the winners, across categories, of the Aarohan Social Innovation Awards 2023 are:
- Healthcare – Subrahmanyam Prasad Muddam and Akitha Kolloju from Hyderabad developed ‘nLite 360’ – an advanced, portable, standalone, and battery-powered smart phototherapy device that provides customized treatment for severe and dynamic jaundice conditions.
- Education – Seetharam Muthangi from Bengaluru developed ‘Smart Vision Glasses’ – an artificial intelligence-enriched assistive device that helps people with visual disabilities identify objects and people, gauge distance, detect currency, read books and manuscripts in Indian regional languages, among other things.
- Women Empowerment – Shelter Associates, an NGO from Pune created ‘One Home One Toilet’ – a data-driven model focused on facilitating sanitized household toilets for underprivileged urban women.
Salil Parekh, Chairman, of Infosys Foundation, said, “Tough real-world problems can only be solved with purposeful innovation. The Aarohan Social Innovation Awards not only celebrate such innovations but empower social innovators by helping them scale up and impact more lives. We commend the participants and congratulate the winners for their contributions to healthcare, education, and women empowerment – themes that are central to Infosys Foundation’s efforts to move us all forward towards an equitable future.”
In addition to the category winners, the jury recognized five exciting social innovations and awarded their creators prize money of INR 10 lakh each. The Jury’s Special Award-winning innovations are:
- Swaasa –An artificial intelligence platform that can be used for the screening and diagnosis of respiratory diseases, created by Narayana Rao Sripada, Manmohan Jain, and Venkat Yechuri in Hyderabad.
- SickleCert – A cost-effective and accurate point-of-care test for sickle-cell anemia that can also be used in prognosis and treatment setup, developed by Prof. Sai Siva Gorthi, Arun Balasubramanian, Rajesh Srinivasan, and Yatish Prasad Dasari in Bengaluru.
- Portia – A self-contained portable oxygen generator providing a continuous, uninterrupted supply of medical-grade oxygen during pre-hospital or pre-ambulatory medical emergencies without any reliance on electricity, batteries, or a skilled healthcare resource, developed by John Joy and Sanjay K Pillai in Bengaluru.
- Emvólio – A portable, battery-powered refrigeration device for last-mile transport of vaccines, developed by Mayur U Shetty in Manipal.
- Modha Pedal Operating Machine – It aims to eradicate chronic knee pain and lower back pain issues faced by women handloom weavers, empowering the longevity of their weaving careers, developed by Sivakumar Modha in Hyderabad.
Sumit Virmani, Trustee, of Infosys Foundation, said, “We laud all the participants and winners who have worked so ardently to create a better future for those in most need of the support. We hope that several others are inspired, by the Aarohan Social Innovation Awards, to contribute and make a difference. The high caliber of social innovations competing for the third edition of the Aarohan Awards deeply impressed the jury members and led us to introduce the ‘Jury’s Special Awards’ to support these innovators and bring much-needed impact to more people and communities.”
