How Not To Win SIH

The day I entered my university, A Senior asked me,Kabhi Hackathon Lagai Hai? Hackathon Lagaya Kro Maza Ataa Hai Aur Projects Bhi Tabhi Bante Hai. I then began participating in a few hackathons at my institution. I used SIH Projects as an inspiration and I won two out of three hackathons I participated in, all because of my amazing team.

Then one fine day, I got a call from a friend of mine, He asked me, SIH m part lena hai?Jaldi jaldi yahan aajao. Another surprise awaited me there since the group I registered with was made up of my own classmates—people I never spoke to.

We turned in our presentation on April 29th, and on June 30th, we were fortunate to learn that we had been nominated for both problem statements we applied for. Without hesitation, the entire team chose to go with the second PS:

As a result, we began to prepare, and our team frequently met, brainstormed, and developed and executed new ideas. In every area, we had no prior experience. Still, we made an effort to understand what was necessary for our project.

To tackle the problem statement, we first broke it into a set of challenges and then discussed these challenges with parents, child experts and teachers. We jolted down the daily problems faced by them and tried to come up with innovative solutions. That's how Vriddhi was born. (Isn't she cute?)

Locations were soon released, and ours was the 2040-mile-away KLE Technological University in Hubli, Karnataka. We bought flying tickets from Chandigarh to Goa, and from Goa, we drove 150 kilometres to Hubli. If I were, to sum up, my journey to Hubli in a single sentence, it would be impulsive, uncertain and exhilarating.

Early morning of 25th August, we arrived at the campus. It was a lovely white structure with coconut palms all around it. After arrival, we had breakfast and attended the inauguration which was motivating in itself and then the hack began around 10. The first mentoring session was at 15:30, so we prepared our idea for it. As we were a well-researched team, we actually laid out our research in front of the mentors. Although they appeared to be happy with it, they nevertheless wanted us to consider it further.

At 19:30, PM Narendra Modi addressed all the SIH Participants, It was rather astonishing to see seventh-grade students come up with such well-thought-out and workable answers to challenges that arise in daily life. So, with renewed motivation, our team set to work on the first round of evaluation. We worked for 2 more hours.

The first round of evaluation included the following criteria: thought process, engineering solutions, and ambition. Even though we all gave our best effort, the judges advised us that we were diverting from the problem statement. It first made me feel unmotivated, but my teammates cheered me up and then we all brainstormed and came up with solutions together.

My teammates and I worked through the night, fueled by coffee and code, and by morning, we had almost finished developing our solution. On 26th August, the second evaluation started at about 9 o'clock, which had implementation as one of its criteria, and we scaled it by focusing solely on the problem statement all night.

Despite being awake till 17.30, we all continued to work. Ayush, one of my teammates, was working on that page of our app 30 minutes before the final review when everything we had done up until that point depended on it. When we realised that we had a chance to win, but only if that page gets finished—and trust me, that was the hardest one we were developing—that was the moment that gave us the most excitement. But let me tell you, it was all because of my teammates that we were able to finish it five minutes before the evaluation. A complete app solution with website support provided me with such a sense of satisfaction before pitching that it strengthened my confidence as I presented my concept to the judges. They seemed impressed and also advised us to make a start-up out of it. We were so anxious after the pitch that we actually fled the building, went to a wrap shop nearby, and ordered wraps while urging one another not to worry about the result.

Soon the prize distribution ceremony began, and the moment of truth arrived, For Problem Statement RK789, TEAM MAVERICKSS. We all, completely numb but with infinite smiles on our faces went on the stage and claimed our prize with tears of joy. After coming back to our seats we hurriedly called our families, our mentors and our friends who supported us throughout, still there is no way I can describe the feeling of winning something so big.

My whole team, Maverickss (Uddeepta, Ayush, Shivam, Harsh, Param) were so good to me, they literally supported me in every decision I made, helped me in everything I did and motivated me every time I felt low. Additionally, I can't pay enough gratitude to my Parents, my mentor PS Rana Sir and my friends, Amit, Hardik, Arvinder, Kshitij, Kriti and Yashvi, who literally eased every single thing for me and supported me in making my dream come true.

Even now, it feels unbelievable :)