Prestigious US Award Won by Mumbai Girls' for Making an Eco-friendly Innovation

  Mumbai girls with their innovation fetch a prestigious US Award for making an eco-friendly gel to get rid of red paan stains which actually contributes to Swachch Bharat Abhiyan launched by PM a few years back.  This eco-friendly solution is not only cost-efficient but also reduces acid & water waste used while cleaning the stains.  Public places in India, historical monuments, railway stations, marketplaces etc. are often seen with red paan stains, which either needs a lot of efforts to remove the same or can be washed away only during heavy rains. But now this is going to be easy with the extensive research and efforts taken by these outstanding eight girls from Ramnarain Ruia college in Mumbai. The team includes Aishwarya Rajurkar, Anjali Vaidya, Komal Parab, Sanika Ambre, Shrutika Sawant, Nishtha Pange, Maithili Sawant and Mitali Patil. The team conducted an anti-spitting drive, "#Paan Se Pareshan" to spread an awareness among the people. They also received a grant of Rs. 10 lakh. Shrutika Sawant, one of the final-year BSc microbiology students from the team told TOI," We met paan vendors to understand the ingredient in the paan that gives the colour. We realized that catechu and slake lime are responsible for the red-brown colour. We also met some cleaners to understand the practical difficulties in washing off paan stains. We interacted with industries to find out about chemicals used as cleaning agents,” The team further mentioned they are working on this product and it will soon be available commercially.  This is definitely going to be a great help to the cleaners.  They won this prestigious Gold Medal at the Genetically Engineered Machines (iGem) competition held by MIT, Boston. They were the only undergraduate college among the 300 global teams to receive an award for the best integrated human practices category. The team was felicitated by CM of Maharashtra for their innovation. Truly a proud moment for all.