Education ministry initiates Vikasit Bharat Buildathon 2025

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Tuesday launched the Viksit Bharat Buildathon 2025, a path-breaking nationwide innovation campaign which will involve students from schools from all over India.

Viksit Bharat Buildathon is being organized by Department of School Education & Literacy (DoSEL), Ministry of Education with Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog, and All India Council for Technical Education as partners. Viksit Bharat Buildathon jingle and logo were also released.

Addressing the function, Pradhan added, "The biggest ever school hackathon, Viksit Bharat Buildathon, would further enrich the culture of innovation at the grassroots level by challenging students to think and create products around four themes - Vocal for Local, Atmanirbhar Bharat, Swadeshi, and Samriddhi."

Sanjay Kumar, Secretary, highlighted how the hackathon would be key to enabling student innovation across India.

The Buildathon wishes to identify young problem-solvers on national as well as international stages. It is at the heels of success after the School Innovation Marathon 2024, with its culmination in Student Innovator Programme (SIP) and Student Entrepreneurship Programme (SEP), patents, and startup businesses emerging from Atal Tinkering Labs.

Process and timeline:

The students will be given a period between 23rd September to 6th October for registration on the Viksit Bharat Buildathon portal (https://vbb.mic.gov.in/). This would be followed by a schools' preparation period, 6th October to 13th October, when the student teams with the help of teachers will undertake the registration on the portal.

The press release also stated, "Students will then share their ideas and prototypes on the portal. The pièce de résistance of Buildathon, the Live Synchronized Innovation Event, will take place on October 13. After the event, the students will publish their final submission between October 13 and October 31.".

These entries will be then judged by an expert panel within a period of two months from November 1 to December 31. The finale in January 2026 will follow thereafter with result announcement and felicitation of the top 1,000+ winners.