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From summer camps to ISRO missions—Indian women are leading STEM

The message is clear—scientific excellence doesn’t have a gender. Young girls can and should dream of touching the sky, literally and figuratively.

I recently had the pleasure of attending a valedictory event at a summer camp for school students at the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi. For six days, students interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics were able to build prototypes, test ideas, collaborate with mentors and turn “insights into impact” in different everyday fields relating to environment, healthcare and rural development. The program was designed for “young change makers”, to allow them to design and execute their innovative ideas in the best-equipped and fanciest labs in the country, if not the world.

And change makers these were. During my interaction with the youth and future of our country, I was most impressed by their concepts, their designs and inventions that approached real problems with practical and well-thought-out solutions. These youngsters had been mentored by some of the brightest minds of the country, and it showed in their final projects. The engineering precision with which they tackled problems such as how to use sensors to send warning signals about waterlogged roads or their use of IoT to sense LPG gas leakages at home was impressive. My favourite was an automatic robotic sewage sucker machine, which could theoretically do away with manual scavenging. I came away suitably humbled by the capacity and capability of these young minds.

As I watched the students present their projects, one glaringly obvious fact stood out—the girls outnumbered the boys. And it was the girls who confidently presented their projects, explaining the working of each model. The boys just seemed to be there as a diversity and inclusivity candidate. Some groups that were completely composed of the fairer sex in their entirety.

I found this an interesting, considering that so........

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