Although Jeremiahs and doomsday prophets lament the reportedly widening technology gap between India and the West, some young engineers suffer no such apprehensions. 

Team AlphaGears comprising Sharafath Shahsu V.P, Nandu J. Krishnan, Sayuj Vijayan T. and Muhammed Asif Abdulla — all final year mechanical engineering students of the low-profile Mudbidri (Karnataka)-based Mangalore Institute of Technology and Engineering — were adjudged winners of the inaugural Platinum prize of Rs.10 lakh for its revolutionary ‘frictionless gear transmission system for vehicles using polymagnets’ at KPIT Sparkle 2017, a design and innovation talent contest open to engineering and science students countrywide.

The national competition based on the theme ‘Smart Cities — Towards a Smarter Coexistence’, organised annually by the Pune-based KPIT Technologies Ltd (estb. 1990) in association with the College of Engineering, Pune, attracted 1,545 entries from 10,518 students of 329 engineering colleges including IIT-Kharagpur and Bhubaneswar, NIT-Hamirpur, and BITS-Pilani, among others. Entries of the top 35 finalist colleges were assessed, evaluated, and adjudged at the Deccan College grounds, Pune on February 19 by a high-powered jury.

“Our frictionless gear transmission system for automobiles overcomes the drawbacks of the current mechanical gear boxes installed in cars and trucks. By using polymagnets, fuel consumption and maintenance costs of automobiles are sharply reduced. We integrated magnets into the traditional automobile gear box to develop a new gear transmission system together with our mentor Prof. Saviraj A.S. We owe a debt of gratitude to our parents for contributing Rs.40,000 towards our project,” says AlphaGears’ spokesperson Sharafath. 

Currently, the team members are focused on their final year examinations scheduled for June. “We have filed a patent for our invention with the intent of marketing it. We plan to invest the prize money into further research and development of our product. And to expand our growth and business plans, we want to accept positions with KPIT — a highly respected engineering services and solutions company — which have been offered to us,” says Sharafath.

Clearly, a win-win proposition.

Paromita Sengupta (Bangalore)
 

Bhargavi Goel

Delhi-based Bhargavi Goel (17) has conceptualised and developed Glorifire, a free mobile Google-registered app which can be downloaded on all Android mobile phones and devices. This hi-tech app has also been selected for The Entrepreneurship School, Gurgaon’s incubation programme and is currently the platform for submitting proposals for the school’s National Youth Idea Contest 2017. 

A class XII student of the CBSE-affiliated Delhi Public School, Vasant Kunj, Bhargavi developed Glorifire, which enables students to showcase and share project ideas, over a three-month period. Using this app, any student countrywide can post a project idea, connect with a mentor, search for a team mate and individuals/institutions for funding. Since it was launched in September, the app has been downloaded over 10,000 times from Google Playstore.

The older child of Dinesh and Monila Goel, directors of FIIT-JEE Ltd, the well-known test prep company which has established 52 coaching institutes countrywide, Bhargavi is head girl of DPS, Vasant Kunj, a Spell Bee finalist, a National Talent Search and Kishore Vaigyanik Protsahan Yojana scholar of the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. And over and above, she’s a pianist, guitarist and basketball player. 

“Prime minister Narendra Modi’s Startup India initiative last January inspired me to ideate and develop this app which helps children collaborate on project ideas and develop entrepreneurial skills. I took the assistance of my seniors Avik Sethia and Saurabh Uttam, both computer science students, to fine tune my app,” says Bhargavi, the founder of Entrepreneurship Promotion and Innovation Council at DPS, Vasant Kunj. 

Presently in the middle of her class XII CBSE school-leaving exam, Bhargavi is keeping her higher study options open. “As a KVPY scholar, I have already qualified for the undergraduate degree programme of the IISc. However, I have also applied to universities in the US and UK. I’ll keep chasing my dream of developing problem-solving apps in the future. So I’ll choose my university very carefully,” says this spunky teen who is clearly set to go places.

Autar Nehru (Delhi)