Jawaharlal Nehru University has won the annual Visitor’s Award for the ‘Best University’, 2017. Dr. Deepak Pant from Central University of Himachal Pradesh won the Visitor’s Award for ‘Innovation’ while the Visitor’s Award for ‘Research’ has been jointly won by Dr. Shyam Sunder from Banaras Hindu University and Prof. Niranjan Karak from Tezpur University.

The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee will present the Visitor’s Awards for the year 2017 at a function to be held at Rashtrapati Bhavan on March 6, 2017, as part of the ‘Festival of Innovations’. President Pranab Mukherjee had announced institution of these awards in 2014 with the aim of promoting healthy competition amongst Central Universities and motivating them to adopt best practices from around the world in the pursuit of excellence.

The Visitor’s Award for ‘Innovation’ will be given to Dr. Deepak Pant, Department of Environmental Science, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Central University of Himachal Pradesh for development of a reactor for direct conversion of waste plastic to LPG in small scale.

The Visitor’s Award for ‘Research’ will be presented jointly to Dr. Shyam Sunder, Department of Medicine, Institute of Medical Sciences, Banaras Hindu University for his work in the area of diagnosis and treatment of Indian Kala-azar and Prof. Niranjan Karak, Department of Chemical Sciences, Tezpur University for development of renewable resource based bio-degradable hyper-branched polymer nano-composites as self-cleaning, self-healing and bio-compatible smart sustainable futuristic material.

The ‘Best University’ will receive a Citation and Trophy while winners of Visitor’s Award for ‘Innovation’ and ‘Research’ will receive a Citation and cash award of Rs. one lakh.

This release issued at 1630 hrs.