Anil Pradhan wins Rohini Nayyar Prize

With the aim of taking these labs to students in rural areas who may not be able to reach them, ‘Tinker-on-Wheels’, a mobile learning lab meant to offer hands-on experience with aspects like robotics and 3D printing, has been set up.

While Pradhan initially began working in his village, his organisation now works in Telangana, Odisha and Tamil Nadu. “Even now we read… ’once there lived a poor farmer in a village’… which means that if you are poor, you are a farmer, and if you are a poor farmer then you are in a village. This sort of mindset needs to change,” Pradhan said at an event where he was presented with the award by R A Mashelkar, scientist and former Director General, CSIR.

The prize has been instituted in the memory of Rohini Nayyar by her family. Nayyar, an economist, served as an IAS officer in the Uttar Pradesh cadre, and worked with the erstwhile Planning Commission of India from 1987 to 2005. She passed away in 2021.

The prize, comprising a cash award of Rs. 10 lakh, a citation and trophy, is given annually by the Nayyar Foundation for Social and Economic Purpose, and is meant for individuals below 40 years in age.

Mashelkar said: “If one looks at her (Rohini Nayyar’s) life’s work in rural development and poverty alleviation, it shows not just a new way of looking at poverty, but a fundamentally different way of tackling it…”