Irish Consulate General, Mumbai Calls Applications for Data Challenge on Women's Safety

By: WE Staff | Tuesday, 2 November 2021

The Irish Consulate General in Mumbai is presenting an intriguing Data Challenge on Women's Safety for students from India and Ireland, in collaboration with the Red Dot Foundation. The registration period will go from November 8 to December 8, 2021, with the virtual challenge finals taking place in February 2022. The winners will be revealed on March 8, 2022, in time for International Women's Day.

Over 100 competitors from higher education institutions in India and Ireland will collaborate to propose solutions for women's safety in this competition.

Throughout the challenge, competitors will attend master-classes and expert panels to gain a better grasp of the subject. They will also be able to work with mentors from academia, industry, and the social sector to develop their ideas. Participants may polish their skills in gender and culturally sensitivity, data analytics and visualisation, critical thinking and problem solving, and "learn by doing" through working in multidisciplinary and intercultural teams.

For the final pitches, eight teams will be chosen, with three winner concepts receiving prize certificates. INR 45000 is the first prize, INR 25000 is the second prize, and INR 15000 is the third prize.

The Data Challenge on Women's Safety seeks to give students with a chance to gain a better understanding of the issue of sexual and gender-based violence via data analysis and visualisation, as well as to suggest ideas and potential solutions. Sexual and gender-based violence is a global epidemic that affects one in every three women at some point in their lives (as per UN Women). Because of the shame and taboo connected with it, this violence goes mostly unreported.

The Data Challenge aims to shatter the taboo around the subject and motivate students to take action. The challenge will be based on the Safecity dataset from the Red Dot Foundation, which contains anonymized cases of sexual and gender-based assault.

Alison Reilly, deputy consul general, Consulate General of Ireland, Mumbai says, “Working with the Red Dot Foundation gives the consulate the opportunity to support an initiative with practical outcomes for women’s safety, while providing a space for Indian and Irish students to meet and exchange ideas. We hope this project will lead to even stronger links between India and Ireland”.

ElsaMarie DSilva, founder of Red Dot Foundation says, “it is important that students are socially aware and sensitive. Participating in the data challenge gives them the opportunity to "learn by doing" as well as develop intercultural skills while working on a complex social problem. We hope they get a deeper insight to the issue of sexual and gender based violence and be motivated to take action to prevent it. We are thrilled to partner with the Consulate General of Ireland in Mumbai and other partners on this challenge”.

The project, which was established with the help of Education in Ireland, would connect students from all around Ireland through UCD College of Science.