SoULS team of IIT Bombay has won first prize in national level Solar Chulha Challenge conducted by ONGC. The prize money is Rs. 10 lakh with additional support to make 1000 solar chulhas.

Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, on the occasion of Pd. Deendayal Upadhyay’s birth anniversary on  September 25, 2017, urged ONGC to take up a challenge to work towards making an ‘efficient electric chulha (stove)’. The challenge was hosted online at https://startup.ongc.co.in and more than 1500 entries were received in the campaign duration.

Based on the abstract submitted by the participants, and after two rounds of screening and discussion, 20 teams were shortlisted by the expert panel chaired by Dr. Anil Kakodkar, Former Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission. They advised the participants to proceed with the development of the prototype/model. Further, these 20 participants were invited to present their initial model and progress on February 24, 2018, based on which 6 teams were shortlisted for final round of evaluation.

The 6 shortlisted teams were then invited to New Delhi to demonstrate live cooking on their solar chulhas. The teams demonstrated cooking twice: once during the day and then after the sunset on April 23, 2018 in front of the expert committee members and ONGC officials, including CMD. After thorough evaluation on the parameters like technology used, readiness of solutions, ability to cook all types of Indian cuisine dishes, adaptability in kitchen, time required for cooking, etc. the team from IIT Bombay has been awarded the first prize on April 24, 2018 by Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Shri Dharmendra Pradhan.