Rourkela, March 27: NIT, Rourkela, has a great atmosphere of innovations, according to a faculty member of the institute's MBA department.

Speaking at the annual Festival of Innovation, organised by the President's secretariat and National Innovation Foundation at Rashtrapati Bhavan between March 12 and 18, Rajeev Panda made a presentation on the atmosphere of innovation at the institute before an audience, which included secretary to the President Oumita Paul, among other dignitaries.

Panda made his presentation at the cultural centre of the Rashtrapati Bhavan on "Inspiring Innovation" on March 15.

"We have made several innovations, including a portable washing machine, weather monitoring system, automated gupchup vending machine, smart pill box, quiz buzzer system. I spoke about all these wonderful projects," said Panda.

The festival is an annual affair for firsthand knowledge about the nation's mood on innovation and the thought process of the innovators.

Panda is part of the institute's technology business incubator and the whole presentation was made on innovation experience at the institute. "I am lucky to represent my institute and my state on such a huge and prestigious platform and letting the world know what we are doing here as far as innovation is concerned," said Panda.

He used posters, which he had made himself, to make his presentation.

"There is a strict security protocol and you are not allowed to carry a pen drive, CD or any such materials. So, I made my presentation through posters," Panda said.

There were 17 faculty members from different institutes, including IIMs, IITs and NITs. "From purely technical institutes, we had participation from IIT Delhi, Madras and Kanpur and NITs, Rourkela and Trichy," said Panda.

The presentation, which was organised by National Innovation Club, began with a keynote address by National Innovation Foundation executive vice-chairman Anil Gupta. This was followed by addresses by the director of Inter Disciplinary Research Foundation of Israel, Oriel Reichmann, and Science and Technology for Social Impact director Nonhlanhla Makhize. Office on Special Duty to the President Suresh Yadav also spoke on the occasion.

"Those three addresses were very inspiring for all of us. Listening to Reichmann was also overwhelming," said Panda.

Regarding this particular initiative, Panda said there were many innovations taking place at the grassroots level but many went unnoticed. The whole initiative was to learn more closely about those innovations taking place in rural, social and technical sectors. An exhibition demonstrating many such selected ideas was held on the exhibition ground of Rashtrapati Bhavan.

President Pranab Mukherjee visited the exhibition and interacted with everyone during the event. "It was not part of his schedule to interact with us but his secretary apprised him about all that we presented there," Panda said.