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Pralhad P Chhabria Awards

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION

Hope Foundation in association with the IEEE India Council and Women In Engineering Affinity Group, IEEE Pune Section has instituted the Pralhad P. Chhabria Awards from the year 2017, in memory of Late Shri Pralhad P Chhabria, Founder President, Hope Foundation. These awards applaud young women for their achievements in undergraduate science / engineering college and/or professional arena.

Late Shri Pralhad P. Chhabria always encouraged and supported education of young women. He firmly believed that women are far superior to men and have always been. They have the ability to make whatever they get, greater. And providing them with good education in turn ensures that they not only share their knowledge and skills for their family; but for the community and the nation.

INTRODUCTION

Hope Foundation in association with the IEEE India Council and Women In Engineering Affinity Group, IEEE Pune Section has instituted the Pralhad P. Chhabria Awards from the year 2017, in memory of Late Shri Pralhad P Chhabria, Founder President, Hope Foundation. These awards applaud young women for their achievements in undergraduate science / engineering college and/or professional arena.

Late Shri Pralhad P. Chhabria always encouraged and supported education of young women. He firmly believed that women are far superior to men and have always been. They have the ability to make whatever they get, greater. And providing them with good education in turn ensures that they not only share their knowledge and skills for their family; but for the community and the nation.

Award Categories & Prizes

Award Category 1: Best Graduate Student
Young female students who have successfully completed a bachelor’s degree in Science, Technology, or Engineering. – Winner and Runner Up

Award Category 2: Best Woman Professional (Early Career Stage)
Young women with 3–7 years of professional experience who have made significant contributions to research, innovation, and creativity, as well as to the technological, economic, and/or social development of the community and the nation – Winner and Runner Up

Winner
₹ 1,25,000

Runner up
₹ 50,000

In addition to the prize money, each award winner and Runner-up will receive a medal and a citation sponsored by the Hope Foundation and Research Centre. For detailed information.

Please visit us  https://hfrc-ieeeawards.org/

Winners of Awards

Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Winner – Dr. Vaanathi Sundaresan

  

Joint Runner Up –Dr. Helen K Joy

  

Joint Runner Up – Dr. Yashasvi Bansal

      

Best Graduate Student

Winner – Pooja Premnath

   

Runner Up – Kiruthika A.

     

Best Woman Professional
(Early Career)

Winner
Dr. Twinkle Tripathy


Dr. Twinkle Tripathy received a Dual Degree of M.Tech. and Ph.D. 

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Runner Up
Dr. Jaya Jha

Dr. Jaya Jha completed her B.Tech from NIT Raipur and joined M. Tech at IIT Bombay after securing AIR 1 in GATE.

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Runner Up
Dr. Revathy Padmanabhan

Dr. Revathy Padmanabhan received the PhD degree from the Indian Institute of Science,

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Best Graduate Student

Encouragement Prize –
G. Pooja


Pooja is a well-rounded Electronics and Communication Engineering graduate from Sri Sairam Engineering College.
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Encouragement Prize -
Buvana C

Buvana C, B.Tech Information Technology student, is passionate about leveraging technology

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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Winner – Rucha Joshi

Dr. Rucha Joshi – Tamaskar, Ph.D., is a faculty at Plaksha, formerly an Assistant Professor at the University of California,
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Runner Up –Dr. Aparna Kumari

Dr. Aparna Kumari, is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Institute of Technology, Nirma University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India.
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Best Outgoing Student

Winner – Ms Debeshee Das

Debeshee Das is currently pursuing her 4th Year of BTech in Computer Science and Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati (IIT-T).
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Joint Runner Up-Ms. Khushi Desarda

Khushi is a final-year Pimpri Chinchwad College of Engineering, Pune student majoring in information technology.
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Joint Runner Up-Reshmaja Ramesh

Reshmaja K Ramesh is a multi-talented final year B.E, Electronics and Communication Engineering student.
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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Winner – Saakshi Dhanekar

Saakshi is an Assistant Professor (Grade 1) with the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Jodhpur.

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Runner Up – Neethu George

A power systems researcher with Hitachi Energy Technology Services Private Ltd., Neethu .

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Best Outgoing Student

Winner – Shatakshi Singh

Shatakshi is a final year student pursuing her B.Tech in Computer Science and Engineering from Mody ..

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Runner Up – Nupur Kulkarni

With an excellent academic record throughout her education, Nupur is currently pursuing her B.E.

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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Winner – Dr. Anupama Ray

Dr. Anupama Ray is an Advisory Research Scientist at IBM Research, India. She is an IBM Quantum Ambassador and a Qiskit Advocate. She completed her Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.
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Runner Up – Dr. Lavika Goel

Dr. Lavika Goel is an IEEE Senior member since November 2020. She is Ph.D. (2015), M.E. (2010), and B. Tech (2008) with distinction in Computer Science & Engineering from Delhi Technological
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Best Outgoing Student

Winner – Deeksha M S

Ms.Deeksha M.S is a final year undergraduate student of Electronics and Communication Engineering at the NIT Surathkal. She holds departmental rank one with a CGPA of 9.72/10.
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Runner Up – Annesya Banerjee

Annesya Banerjee, is a Final-Year Undergraduate student in the Department of Electronics and Tele-Communication Engineering at Jadavpur University studying Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.).
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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Winner – Dr. Anupama Ray

Dr. Anupama Ray is an Advisory Research Scientist at IBM Research, India. She is an IBM Quantum Ambassador and a Qiskit Advocate.

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Runner Up – Dr. Lavika Goel

Dr. Lavika Goel is an IEEE Senior member since November 2020. She is Ph.D. (2015), M.E. (2010), and B. Tech (2008)

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Best Outgoing Student

Winner – Deeksha M S

Ms.Deeksha M.S is a final year undergraduate student of Electronics and Communication Engineering at the NIT Surathkal.

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Runner Up – Annesya Banerjee

Annesya Banerjee, is a Final-Year Undergraduate student in the Department of Electronics and Tele-Communication

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Ms. Janani R

currently a final year student pursuing her Electronics and Comm. Engg. at Anna University. She has won accolades in technical and management skills. She has inspired young women to get involved in
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Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh

Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh an Associate Professor at SSN College of Engineering, Chennai has completed her B.E. in Electronics & Comm. followed by Masters and Ph.D. in Design, Development,
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Dr. Anupama Kowli

Dr. Anupama Kowli is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical Engg., at IITB, She completed her B. E. in Electrical from VJTI, Mumbai, and her Masters and Ph.D. from Grainger College of Engg.,
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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Ms. Janani R

Ms. Janani R currently a final year student pursuing her Electronics and Comm. Engg. at Anna University.

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Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh

Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh an Associate Professor at SSN College of Engineering, Chennai

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Best Outgoing Student

Dr. Anupama Kowli

Dr. Anupama Kowli is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical Engg., at IITB.

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Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya

Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya has been declared the winner for “Best Outgoing Student”. She is in the final year of B.Tech (Computer Engineering) at Mody University, College of Engineering and Technology,
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Dr. Soma Biswas

Dr. Soma Biswas has been bestowed with the award of “Best Woman Engineer” (professional in early career). She is currently working as Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru.
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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Ms Shubhi Sareen

Ms Shubhi Sareen who is currently pursuing her final year B.Tech at Delhi Technical University won the Best Outgoing Female Student

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Best Outgoing Student

Dr. Rajlaxmi Chouhan

Dr. Rajlaxmi Chouhan currently working as Assistant Professor at IIT Jodhpur won the Vest Woman Professional (early career stage) Award.

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Ms Shubhi Sareen

who is currently pursuing her final year B.Tech at Delhi Technical University won the Best Outgoing Female Student. She has always been an ace student with top scores through her entire academic. She holds the
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Dr. Rajlaxmi Chouhan

currently working as Assistant Professor at IIT Jodhpur won the Vest Woman Professional (early career stage) Award. Her research interests include image processing, image quality assessment and noise-aided image denoising.
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Best Woman Professional (Early Career)

Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya

Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya has been declared the winner for “Best Outgoing Student”

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Best Outgoing Student

Dr. Soma Biswas

Dr. Soma Biswas has been bestowed with the award of “Best Woman Engineer” (professional in early career).

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Winner – Dr. Twinkle Tripathy

Dr. Twinkle Tripathy is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering of Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur.

She received a Dual Degree of M.Tech. and Ph.D. at Systems & Control Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in Dec. 2016. Thereafter, she served at the School of Electrical & Electronic Engineering, NTU, Singapore and with the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology as a post-doctoral fellow till Aug. 2020. Her research interests broadly include control and guidance of autonomous systems, opinion formation in social networks and consensus problems in multi-agent systems. Based on her professional activities, she was recently elevated to the position of a Senior Member of IEEE. She is also the recipient of the ‘Young Woman Researcher in Control Systems’ award, conferred by the Venus International Foundation in 2025.

Runner Up –Dr. Jaya Jha

Dr. Jaya Jha completed her B.Tech from NIT Raipur and joined M. Tech at IIT Bombay in 2015 after securing AIR 1 in GATE. She was also a recipient of the prestigious Prime Minister’s Research Fellowship. After that, she worked as an Institute Postdoctoral fellow at IIT Bombay for a year, where she was engaged in technology development and system-level integration of GaN devices for satellite and radar applications. She has also worked with Finwave semiconductor USA before joining IIT (BHU) Varanasi as an Assistant Professor in December 2022. She has delivered invited talks in IEEE sensors winter school at IIT Guwahati and “High-Performance Wide Band-gap Semiconductor Devices” workshop at IIT Bombay. She was a TPC member and session chair at IEEE EDTM Conference. Her current research interests include Reliability of wide bandgap semiconductor based devices, GaN HEMT based biosensors and Nano-scale device simulations and modeling, etc.

Runner Up – Dr. Revathy Padmanabhan

Dr. Revathy Padmanabhan received the PhD degree from the Indian Institute of Science, where she worked on investigating different high-k dielectrics for capacitors used in analog/RF and memory applications.Subsequently, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, during which she worked on the development of CMOS-compatible photodetectors. Currently, she is an Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology Palakkad, where she works with her research group on multiple projects, including designing, fabricating and characterizing memristors for neuromorphic applications, electrochromic devices, and multi-functional optically sensitive devices using perovskites and layered semiconductors. They also work on engineering porous membranes for water desalination and energy storage applications. She has been actively involved in setting up the Central Micro-Nano Fabrication Facility (CMFF) and the Central Instrumentation Facility (CIF) at IIT Palakkad, and currently coordinates the activities at CMFF.

Runner Up – Dr. Revathy Padmanabhan

She has received notable recognitions as a “NASA Citizen Scientist” through the International Asteroid Search Campaign, the Best Outgoing Student Award (2024), and Outstanding Performance Appreciation from FACEPREP. She has won multiple awards in research and business pitch contests from esteemed platforms such as IETE, IEI, IEEE, IIITDM, NIT Trichy, and the International Mobile Congress. As a Research Intern at SAMEER-CEM (R&D, Govt. of India), she specialized in antenna design and RF circuits, collaborating with scientists and contributing to two patents and publications in reputed journals. She has held leadership roles, such as Chairperson of the IEEE Nanotechnology Council and IEEE Day Ambassador, organizing events like IEEE Xtreme, Tech Ninja, and others across professional forums. She has also received ambassadorial nominations for IEEE DAY, the G20 Summit, TEDx Y20, and India Today Perception. Her article on satellite design was published in Galactica Magazine (SPACE INDIA) under the iAstronomer category, and she has contributed as a content writer for IETE Students’ Corner and IEEE Society sites. As a Carnatic vocalist, she has performed on prestigious stages like All India Radio and has won prizes in Purandara Dasa music and Bhagavad Gita recitation competitions for consecutive years. She has mentored students, served as a panelist, and conducted skill development programs. She envisions empowering underprivileged students through education and career guidance, dedicating her prize money to research and outreach initiatives.

Encouragement Prize - Buvana C

Buvana C, a final-year B.Tech Information Technology student, is passionate about leveraging technology to drive societal impact. Over the past four years, she has spearheaded multiple innovative projects, including the “Hygiene Hydro” initiative which secured $3500 from IEEE HAC to provide clean water to rural communities, and the “IoT-Based Smart Cane for the Visually Impaired,” which received $746 from IEEE EPICS and led to a patent and research publication.Her commitment to sustainability and innovation is reflected in her on-campus efforts, such as a floral waste management project funded with INR 15,000, which transformed waste into valuable products. She has published four IEEE papers and earned numerous accolades, including the Best Contributor Award from UBA, the Best Outgoing Student Award from Sairam Engineering College, and the Ingenious Pen Award from the IEEE CS Society. Beyond academics, Buvana actively engages in social service through organizations like Maatram Foundation, where she was recognized with the Stars of Maatram and Smt. Malathi Jayasekar Awards for her contributions to education and community welfare. As an NSS Volunteer, UBA Guide, and IEEE Technical Member, she has led impactful initiatives and secured top positions in national-level hackathons and competitions. With a vision to eradicate poverty through technological innovation, Buvana strives to create solutions that foster growth, sustainability, and inclusivity. Her journey exemplifies a blend of technical expertise, leadership, and a deep commitment to societal betterment.

Winner – Dr. Rucha Joshi

Dr. Rucha Joshi – Tamaskar, Ph.D., is a faculty at Plaksha, formerly an Assistant Professor at the University of California, Davis; and a postdoctoral fellow at Purdue University, where she worked on tissue engineering as well as engineering education research, specifically on biomaterials, drug delivery and instructional innovation using active learning in biomedical engineering. Rucha received a BS in biotechnology engineering from Shivaji University, India, in 2009, and MS in biomedical engineering from Vanderbilt University in 2011. Rucha has two patents, on making low calorie biscuits from banana peel pulp, and second on “collagen based therapeutic delivery systems”. Her current research focuses on silk-biomaterials, project-based learning, personalizing learning, and entrepreneurially minded engineers. She is also a director for Grand Challenges Scholars Program at Plaksha, creating experiential learning through a combined curricular, co-curricular, and extra-curricular program.
Rucha has been active on making engineering inclusive to the underrepresented high school students in India and the United States. Her latest book on collagen based drug delivery was published by Springer in 2021. Rucha also wrote a book in Marathi telling a story of her journey of representing India at Japan in class 12th, being honored by Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, the late president of India, for her invention of “low calorie biscuits from banana peel pulp”. This book in Marathi, “Bhartiya Balvaidnyanik achi Garudzep”, summarizing her life experiences in inspiring Indian students towards STEM pursuits, won a literary award from the State Government of Maharashtra in 2008. Rucha is actively working to promote the inclusive maker movement as a part of the Inclusive University Alliance, and building inclusive STEM DIY activities to address the higher learning needs of visually impaired high school children. She has served as a BME Liaison for the Committee for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (CDEI) of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) in 2021-22, and as a secretary of New Engineering Educators division of ASEE in 2019-20. She was invited on the advisory committee for the 10th International Conference in Transformations in Engineering Education (ICTEIEE) 2023, organized by the Indo Universal Collaboration for Engineering Education (IUCEE). In 2022, she served as the healthcare area co-chair for the International Conference on AI at Plaksha. She is active member of IEEE, SWE and a reviewer for peer publication of manuscripts (eg. Journal of Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces, Journal of Engineering Education). On extra-curriculars, Rucha loves acting, hiking, wild-life sfaris, star-gazing, Indian Classical Singing, collecting stones, and assemblage art. Rucha is also a NAUI certified SCUBA diver and 2023 Punjab state badminton winner in 35+ Women category, representing Punjab in 45th National Badminton Veterans Championship.

Runner Up – Dr. Aparna Kumari

Dr. Aparna Kumari, is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Institute of Technology, Nirma University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India. She focuses on cutting-edge research and teaching. Her broad research area includes Smart Grid Systems, Blockchain Technology, Electric Vehicles, and Renewable Energy Sources
She has been listed in the world’s Top 2% Scientists as per the list published by Stanford University’s USA in the years 2021 and 2022. Two of her novel works on COVID-19 have been approved by the WHO and included in their “COVID-19 Global literature on coronavirus disease” database. She authored/coauthored 40 publications (28 in peer-reviewed SCI-indexed International journals, 10 papers presented in top-tier IEEE International conferences, and 02 book chapters in Springer and IET). She is an active member of IEEE and Women in Engineering (WIE) India. She strives to contribute to society through her outreach to societal projects. She shall partly utilize the prize money for her research work and her research lab. She aims to facilitate access to resources for underprivileged students.

Winner – Ms Debeshee Das

Debeshee Das is currently pursuing her 4th Year of BTech in Computer Science and Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati (IIT-T). She has consistently been a top academic performer, securing International Rank 1 in the National Science Olympiad (NSO) by SOF (Asia’s Largest Olympiad) for 2 consecutive years. She was awarded the prestigious national level scholarships NTSE and KVPY by the Government of India for meritorious students. She is passionate about exploring technical ideas in-depth and has worked on research projects in explainable AI, software security and source code representations for AI-powered software engineering tasks.
She interned at IBM Research Labs in 2022, and has a peer-reviewed publication at the ACM EASE 2022 conference. A graduate in Indian Classical music, she is an enthusiastic student leader, heading various clubs and technical events while being the Editor-in-Chief of IIT Tirupati’s student magazine. She is passionate about finding innovative ways to fill the gaps in the traditional education system and takes up various initiatives, from building relevant apps to voluntary teaching. Keeping aside a portion for her higher studies, she intends to use the award for programs that provide quality education to underprivileged students.

Joint Runner Up – Khushi Desarda

Khushi is a final-year Pimpri Chinchwad College of Engineering, Pune student majoring in information technology. She is now interning at HP, Inc. She is an avid competitor in various coding contests. She participated in DD-Robocon 2021and won AIR 4 along with Promising Performer Award. She is the 2021 recipient of the Virtual Grace Hopper Celebration Student Scholarship.
Two research papers available on IEEE Xplore and one patent published under Khushi’s name attest to her innovation and research abilities. She has received a copyright grant for the summary of one of her concepts. She won the Jury Award for Innovation at the TCS Sustainathon Pune 2021. She is a finalist in La Trobe University’s Technology Infusion Grand Challenge. Khushi has actively volunteered for IEEE as the Social Media Coordinator of the IEEE India Council. She skillfully used IEEE as her professional home and set an example for others. Khushi particupated in the Educational Game Development Project for the Raja Dinkar Kelkar Museum in Pune. She is the consecutive two times winner of the IEEE Eu-Reka 2020 and 2021 competitions. Khushi would like to use the part of the prize money to continue her IEEE journey and publish more research. A portion of the prize money would be used to apply for higher education. In addition, she wants to donate to the orphanage, organize tree-plantation drives and purchase thought-provoking books. This prize will serve as an encouragement for her as she works to accomplish her goals and support social and economic growth in society.

Joint Runner Up – Reshmaja Ramesh

Reshmaja K Ramesh is a multi-talented final year B.E, Electronics and Communication Engineering student. She has been the inventor of 4 patents and has published several International Research Articles in prestigious publications like IEEE and Springer. Reshmaja has received recognition for her projects from IEEE, IETE, IIT, SONY, and SAMEER (R&D, DIT govt of India). Also, she has been recognized by NASA as a citizen scientist through International Asteroid Search Campaign. She got the Gold Honora award in International Astrophysics and Astronomy contest, the Young Achiever 2022 award from the rotary club and the Special Achiever 2022 award from Chrompet Malayali Association.
Reshmaja has additionally undertaken multiple extracurricular activities. She is the Women in tech lead of the google developer student club, and Secretary of the Industrial electronics and Signal processing society of IEEE. She is a professional classical (Bharatanatyam and Mohiniyattam) dancer and received the YuvashreeKalaimamani award for the same. She has also been the winner of Kerala Natanam and NadodiNritham conducted by the Confederation of Tamil Nadu Malayali Association. She has won the Bhagavad Gita and Vishnu Sahasranamam sloka recitation Competitions conducted by Chinmaya Mission consecutively for 12 years. She would like to use her prize money partly for her projects and most of it for her outreach program to boost the count of women in technology.

Winner – Saakshi Dhanekar

Saakshi is an Assistant Professor (Grade 1) with the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Jodhpur. She works in the development of gas and biosensors based on nanomaterials, heterostructures. Prior to joining IIT Jodhpur, she had worked as SERB Research Scientist and INSPIRE Faculty at Centre for Biomedical Engineering and Centre for Applied Research in Electronics (CARE), IIT Delhi respectively from 2013-2019.

In addition to teaching, she has two ongoing Govt. sponsored projects through which she is developing indigenous sensors to be used in AI and IoT applications. Currently, she has 6 Ph.D. students under her supervision and 2 patents to her credit. She has published several research articles and conference proceedings in the past few years. Her current research area includes MEMS, nano silicon, metal oxides-based gas, and biosensors for societal applications with applications in AI and IoT.
The prize money holds a lot of value for her. As the Chair of the IEEE Sensors Council Young Professionals and wellbeing committee, and WIE member, she would like to utilize this award money to help the young population and women by promoting technical education amongst the students. It will be utilized for the implementation of webinars/seminars for industry, projects focusing on technical, humanitarian, and outreach aims, and providing students with hands-on experience on sensor boards

Runner Up – Neethu George

A power systems researcher with Hitachi Energy Technology Services Private Ltd., Neethu works in the broad area of power system protection, monitoring, and analytics, especially for upcoming grids with increased contribution of renewable energy sources.
She is also engaged in the identification of new research problems through discussions with the R&D team, customers, and fellow researchers and eventually,
developing innovative solutions for the identified problems, which can be practically implemented and delivered to end customers successfully. She is also involved in the exploration and utilisation of various tools, including the most advanced and futuristic technologies, in collaboration with a global team of researchers for the most successful outcomes.
Beyond her research work, she is also committed to disseminating knowledge through conferences, workshops, and publications. She also works toward Creating Intellectual Property as part of her work.
Neethu’s contributions in power system protection research area, mainly for grids with renewable energy resources, facilitate India’s journey towards the goal of a cleaner, greener, and sustainable future. Being a devoted mother, a passionate scientist, and an active contributor to the empowerment of girls and women in society, winning this award is a great motivation for her to take forward the vision of this award and use the prize money for future activities empowering women, especially underprivileged girl students.

Winner – Shatakshi Singh Tomar

Shatakshi is a final year student pursuing her B.Tech in Computer Science and Engineering from Mody University of Science and Technology, Rajasthan. Apart from her curriculum, she has a few research papers that have been published in reputed journals and conferences to her credit.

As an active IEEE volunteer with various IEEE Communities across the region including IEEE Delhi Section, IEEE India Council, and currently, is the chairperson of IEEE Student Branch, Mody University of Science and Technology.

She has many accolades to her credit. She won the SoftTech Hack 2020, received a cash prize for a paper presentation given by the Computer Society of India, was the runner-up at Ideathon 2020, won the first position at a 6-day Code Coding contest, and others.

She has also received the Richard E. Merwin Student Scholarship and is the mentor at her University’s Chess Club.
With a keen interest to pursue her research, Shatakshi eventually plans to be an entrepreneur. She aspires to develop economical and affordable Artificial Intelligence-powered diagnoses for diseases like diabetes and cancer as most of her current research is in a similar domain including her internship in the R&D department at a US Based Healthcare startup. She would like to use part of the award money to develop projects that are based on her research ideas while also pursuing her higher studies.
Some part of the prize money will be utilized to develop the projects based on the ideas I have worked on till now and to pursue my higher education. This Award is motivation and catalyst to help her achieve her goals while contributing to society for social and economic development.

Runner Up – Nupur Kulkarni

With an excellent academic record throughout her education, Nupur is currently pursuing her B.E. under the Savitribai Phule Pune University. She has been a University Rank holder for merit in academics for two consecutive years.
An active student even beyond academics, Nupur has won honors like being one of the finalists at Technology Infusion Grand Challenge 2021
organized by La Trobe University, Australia. She was also the winner of the Smart India hackathon (SIH) 2020 for the problem statement proposed by DTE towards IT and Cyber Security – Captcha for Visually Impaired.
Nupur has authored a research paper on Doodling Based Captcha Authentication System and has more papers in the pipeline to be presented at conferences. She has also authored a chapter in the book “BlockChain for Smart Systems: Computing Technologies and Applications” which will be published soon.
Nupur is also actively involved in cultural activities like singing, writing plays, and essays which have all won her different awards.
She lies to delve deeper into understanding diverse domains and would like to pursue her research. She aims to make use of her technical knowledge got through research to impact the lives of people positively. Nupur would like to utilize the prize money to pay towards her higher education as well as invest some into new projects that she has in mind. Being an avid reader, she would also like to buy books to add to her collection.

Winner – Dr. Anupama Ray

Dr. Anupama Ray is an Advisory Research Scientist at IBM Research, India. She is an IBM Quantum Ambassador and a Qiskit Advocate. She completed her Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.

Her doctoral research focusing on developing and applying multi-dimensional deep recurrent neural networks for document analysis and computer vision applications.

At IBM Research she has been predominantly working in the area of natural language processing: building NLP systems for low-resource languages, domain-independent information extraction systems, and natural language generation. She has interests in Quantum ML, Quantum NLP, and AI for societal applications. She has published several papers in top-tier conferences and journals and has received several Best paper awards. She has been the recipient of the Research Division Award, Eminence and Excellence Award, and Outstanding Technical Achievement Award for her innovations and contributions at IBM Research. She was nominated and selected as a Young Scientist in Global Young Scientist Summit and is an active member of IEEE, AAAI, and Society of Women Engineers (SWE) India.

Runner Up – Dr. Lavika Goel

Dr. Lavika Goel is an IEEE Senior member since November 2020. She is Ph.D. (2015), M.E. (2010), and B. Tech (2008) with distinction in Computer Science & Engineering from Delhi Technological University, Delhi, India. Her research areas include nature-inspired intelligence, optimization algorithms, hybrid intelligent systems, soft computing, remote sensing, and satellite image processing.

She is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at Malaviya National Institute of Technology (NIT), Jaipur, India. She earlier worked at Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani during 2015 – 2020. She holds corporate experience working at Oracle India Private Ltd.

She has published around 60 research papers in SCI-indexed International conferences, journals, and book chapters including Elsevier, IEEE, Taylor and Francis, Springer, etc. She has published a textbook on Artificial Intelligence for undergraduate students which got published in January 2021 by Wiley Publications. She received in August 2019, approval of external funding of Rs. 40 lakhs as Co-Principal Investigator from Department of Science and Technology (DST), Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems division for her novel idea of using nature-inspired heuristics and deep learning for designing a question answering system. She is a life member of the Institution of Engineers India Ltd. (IEI), India, and Machine Intelligence and Research Labs (MIR), Washington, USA. She was awarded the prestigious ‘Young Scientist award’ by VIFRA International Foundation in 2015.

Winner – Deeksha M S

Ms.Deeksha M.S is a final year undergraduate student of Electronics and Communication Engineering at the NIT Surathkal. She holds departmental rank one with a CGPA of 9.72/10. Being passionate about researching signal processing applications in a biomedical setting, Deeksha has undertaken multiple projects in collaboration with prestigious institutes such as IISc Bengaluru and EPFL Switzerland.
She aims at obtaining a doctoral degree to grow into a skillful biotech entrepreneur and has successfully procured Ph.D. admits to Johns Hopkins University and Georgia Institute of Technology. Strongly believing in social interdependence, Deeksha strives to contribute to society through her outreach programs to the underprivileged sections. She shall partly utilize the prize money for her education while dedicating most of it to expand her social services. She aims to provide equal access to resources to all students at an early age.

Runner Up – Annesya Banerjee

Annesya Banerjee, is a Final-Year Undergraduate student in the Department of Electronics and Tele-Communication Engineering at Jadavpur University studying Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.). She achieved a position among the Top 20 students in the State-Level Board Examinations and now holds the Top-most rank in my department with a CGPA of 9.84/10.

She is a recipient of the prestigious Jagadis Bose National Science Talent Search (JBNSTS) Senior Scholarship. Her academic excellence has also been recognized through the Department Gold Medal and Scholarships from Jadavpur University. She has led her team in multiple innovative research projects, which have received appreciation nationally and internationally.

These project works have also been recognized by academic/research organizations like the University of California (UC) Berkeley, Department of Telecommunications – Government of India, and industrial organizations like Microsoft, WeRobotics, etc., through multiple Research Grants, Awards. Additionally, she remains involved in activities to encourage other students to pursue Science, Engineering, and Technology.

Ms. Janani R

Ms. Janani R is currently a final year student pursuing her Electronics and Comm. Engg. at Anna University. She has won accolades in technical and management skills. She has inspired young women to get involved in STEM filed through the Girl Script Foundation and Sagacity Hunt Team.

Her research on Design and Fabrication of Wheelchair and Stretcher using IoT is poised to be a path breaking help to many people in the country. Ms. Janani also volunteered in the IEEE Smart village South Asia Working Group which gave her the platform to help the Tribals of Sirualai using one of the upcoming domains – ‘Hydroponics’. She has also done research in Nanophotonics and Nanomedicine and her patent for wheelchair-cum-stretcher is under review.

Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh

Dr. Esther Florence Sumarsingh an Associate Professor at SSN College of Engineering, Chennai has completed her B.E. in Electronics & Comm. followed by Masters and Ph.D. in Design, Development, and Performance Evaluation of Conformal Textile Antennas.

She has developed the novel textile-based microwave components that led to her first patent. She has filed three more patents for developing low-cost testing (sensing) devices for various applications including healthcare; while she also started working on wearable product development including a patent filed for offering a cost-effective wearable alternative to polysomnography for the diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea.

She further developed a loom that can introduce technical functionalities in the produced cloth fabric. She received a grant from DST SERB GoI (Rs.30.91 Lakh), for developing a computer-controlled loom for the making of textile antennas and sensors. These end products were also deployed for socio-friendly applications such as kyphosis detection & location tracking for fishermen at sea (was submitted as a proposal for CSR initiative of HCL Technologies and was shortlisted among the top 6 at SSNCE)

Dr. Anupama Kowli

Dr. Anupama Kowli is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical Engg., at IITB, She completed her B. E. in Electrical from VJTI, Mumbai, and her Masters and Ph.D. from Grainger College of Engg., the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her doctoral research has been on “Reinforcement Learning Techniques for Power Networks”.

She was awarded the BHAVAN Fellowship by DST and IUSSTF to visit Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the US in 2020 to facilitate research in grid-integrated energy-efficient buildings. She was also invited as a visitor to conduct research in Isaac Newton Institute, the University of Cambridge under the Mathematics of Energy Systems program in April / May 2019.

Further, she has spearheaded the development of sensors and actuators for energy management applications. She has also worked with electric utilities in Gujarat to create software support for planning and operational decision-making. She has 28 published works that span areas of smart grids, demand response, optimization, and renewable integration. Her research in demand response and electricity markets is highly cited. She also holds a patent on low-cost PIR sensing solutions for detecting spatial occupancy patterns.

Ms Shubhi Sareen

who is currently pursuing her final year B.Tech at Delhi Technical University won the Best Outgoing Female Student. She has always been an ace student with top scores through her entire academic. She holds the First Rank at the departmental level with an aggregate CGPA of 9.82.

She has organized as well as actively participated in various academic and co-curricular activities. She is the Co-Founder and Chapter Head of Delhi Women in Machine Learning and Data Sciences. Shubhi has worked on different research projects and is highly appreciated by her professor for her ability to tackle complexities and pressure. Beyond academics, Shubhi has worked towards helping students through The Mentorship Program that allowed students to be paired with leaders in the field to enhance their professional development.

Having won this prestigious Award, Shubhi would like to invest a part of this amount in her education and utilise the remaining amount to promote mentorship programs as well as dedicate a part of the money to chapters like Women Who Code – a platform that helped her grow and network during her undergrad. Her aim is to work together towards closing the gender gap in technology.

Dr. Rajlaxmi Chouhan

Dr. Rajlaxmi Chouhan, currently working as Assistant Professor at IIT Jodhpur won the Vest Woman Professional (early career stage) Award. Her research interests include image processing, image quality assessment and noise-aided image denoising. She was awarded the National Award for Best M.Tech. Thesis in Electronics and Electrical Engineering in 2012 by Indian Society of Technical Education, New Delhi.

Her current research on image quality assessment aims to quantify naturalness of an image and to develop online image tamper detection systems that potentially block spreading of misinformation online. She has published 27 papers in international conferences and journals, and is currently supervising two doctoral students.

Carrying out her duties with full sincerity as an instructor, a researcher, and an IEEE WIE member, Rajlaxmi strives to continue this endeavour by promoting the technical community in Jodhpur. The prize money would be utilised for the successful execution of (i) humanitarian activities including the outreach program for local girls schools that have limited resources and facilities to encourage girls to take up science as a career option; (ii) a primary education program for children of workers in and around Karwad village (Jodhpur). This prize money would be a great catalyst in her efforts.

Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya

Ms. Jayati Vijaywargiya has been declared the winner for “Best Outgoing Student”. She is in the final year of B.Tech (Computer Engineering) at Mody University, College of Engineering and Technology, Madhya Pradesh. With consistent academic excellence, Ms. Jayati has done her Bachelor Thesis in a research institute, GSI, Darmstadt, Germany.

There she built a GUI to analyse and calculate relevant parameters affected due to Quenching in superconducting material. The physical model used for developing the Quench Calculation Software was a rod of Cu+NbTi insulated by a non-conducting material.

She was also part of the GET Involved 3-month Summer internship there. Also, as part of the internship at DRDO, she made an object detector and analyser software on QT. Jayati has 4 research papers that have been selected to be published.

Dr. Soma Biswas

Dr. Soma Biswas has been bestowed with the award of “Best Woman Engineer” (professional in early career). She is currently working as Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru. Dr. Soma’s primary focus at IISc is on cutting-edge research and teaching. She works in the general area of Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition with a special focus on surveillance applications and cross-modal retrieval.

She has also been involved as the Principal Investigator for many Government and private projects which are of national interest and have also mentored a few start-ups in her area of interest.

She holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland, USA. Dr. Soma has to her credit 2 patents and has published 36 research papers, of which 29 are in international journals and 7 are national journals.

Dr. B. B. Ahuja

Member

Prof. B. B. Ahuja is the Former Director, College of Engineering, Pune. Prof. B. B. Ahuja is a graduate in Mechanical Engineering with a post-graduate degree in Mechanical Engineering.  For his doctorate, he did his research in the area of Hybrid Bearing Design for High Speed Spindles at College of Engineering, Pune (COEP).

 He also holds a Master’s degree in Management Science. He has to his credit over 130 technical published papers in National & International Journals and Conferences.

For his zeal and commitment recognizing his excellent teaching skills he was honoured with Best Teacher Award by Government of Maharashtra in the year 2009-10.

He is a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers (India) and the Indian Institution of Production Engineers. He is a member of, Computer Society of India, Operations Research Society of India and the Association of Mechanisms, Robotics Society of India and Machines Indian Society for Technical Education. He is also a Member of the Romanian Society of Mechanical Engineers of Romania.

Hope Foundation’s Finolex Academy of Management & Technology, Ratnagiri has been conferred with the prestigious “Excellence in Digital Transformation in Education” award at the BW Businessworld’s India Smart University Awards 2026, in association with BW Education held at New Delhi on 25th March 2026.

Dr. Y. M. Gajmal

Best Paper Award

The Department of Information Technology is pleased to announce that our faculty Dr. Yogesh Manohar Gajmal received the Best Paper Award in Springer Conference – International Conference on Computational Intelligence and Network Systems (CINS 2023) held from 18 to 20 October at Dubai, UAE.