IIT Kanpur, in collaboration with the National Health Authority and Indian Council of Medical Research–NIRDHDS, successfully organized the Federated Intelligence Hackathon on DPG for Health AI as a pre-event to the India AI Impact Summit 2026.

The hackathon was held from 19–23 January 2026 and brought together 374 innovators from across India, who worked on three healthcare AI tracks — Bone Age Prediction, Cataract Detection, and Diabetic Retinopathy.

In addition to the hackathon, a workshop on Digital Health Stack was also conducted from 23rd-24th January 2026.

The event was graced by Dr. Sunil Kumar Barnwal, IAS (CEO, National Health Authority), Smt. Ritu Maheshwari, IAS (Secretary, Medical Health & Family Welfare and MD, ABDM UP), Mrs. Neha Jain, IAS (Special Secretary, Department of IT & Electronics, Government of UP), Prof. Manindra Agrawal (Director, IIT Kanpur), Prof. Nisheeth Srivastava (Centre for Developing Intelligent Systems), and Prof. Sandeep Verma (Head, Gangwal School of Medical Science & Technology), who shared insights on building a responsible, scalable, and privacy-preserving Health AI ecosystem for India.

Winners of the Federated Intelliegence Hackathon were:
Diabetic Retinopathy:
1st prize: Team Bakai
2dn: Team TANUH Foundation
3rd: Team Dev Titans

Bone Age Prediction:
1st: Team Federated Nexus
2nd: Team Sushruta
3rd: Team Bioraptors

Cataract Detection:
1st: Team Care Coders
2nd Team Drishti Punj

With a prize pool of ₹12 Lakhs, the hackathon recognised outstanding innovation and real-world applicability in healthcare AI.

By bringing together academia, government, startups, and healthcare professionals, this initiative marks a significant step toward building India’s Digital Public Infrastructure for Health AI.