NITI Aayog selects Chennai youth as ‘Mentor of Change’

The AIM has been conceptualised to promote a culture of entrepreneurship and serve as a platform to establish world-class innovation hubs, start-up businesses and other self-employment activities.  

Nanditha, an industry marketer at Freshworks, is also a magazine editor, who hosts freelance events and works with art groups in the community. The enterprising Chennaiite, is now setting up an Atal Tinkering Laboratory (ATL) in a city school, as part of the mission, and be a mentor to school children, encouraging creativity, adaptive learning and skillsets outside the traditional classroom. 

“One doesn’t need to come from a teaching background to become a mentor under NITI Aayog; I think the fact that I indulge in diverse activities and come from different cities added to my selection, apart from my vision for the AIM mission. 

2000 schools across India have been hand-picked for the programme, and I’ve been assigned Kendriya Vidyalaya in Chennai to set up an ATL, with state-of-the-art equipment and facilities,” says Nanditha, who is excited about handling her first class soon with a batch of 100 students. 

NITI Aayog was formed in 2015, with the government’s main focus on making India a self-sustaining economic super power. 

Their ‘Mentor of Change’ programme involves the choosing of young leaders who can guide students in more than 900 Atal Tinkering Labs all over India, with a future plan of establishing the same in every district in India. With her areas of interests being communication, creative thinking, digital literacy, innovation and so on, Nanditha is eager to foster innovation among the students. “I will be visiting them weekly, and working actively to make a difference,” she concludes.