The People’s Festival of Innovation kicks off in New Delhi, 2025 edition celebrates ideas that transform India

New Delhi: The People’s Festival of Innovation 2025 was inaugurated on 17 November 2025 at IIC–New Delhi, in the presence of some of India’s most inspiring leaders in grassroots and deep-tech innovation. Among the dignitaries were Dr. Renu Swarup, Prof. Anil Gupta, Dr. Swati Basu, Dr. Taslimarif Saiyed, and several other distinguished guests whose life’s work has shaped India’s inclusive innovation landscape.

Bringing together more than 150 participants, the festival became a vibrant meeting ground for innovators from both grassroots and deep-tech domains. Under the central theme “From Spark to Scale: Transforming Innovative Ideas to Socially Relevant Solutions,” the gathering explored how ideas born in small labs, rural communities, and individual minds can be scaled into tangible solutions that uplift society.

Organised by the Gujarat Grassroots Innovation Augmentation Network (GIAN), the Honey Bee Network, and C-CAMP, the festival offered an immersive experience through sessions, masterclasses, and storytelling interactions. This unique blend of grassroots wisdom and advanced technology provided deep reflection and learning for participants seeking to create real impact.

One of the festival’s defining moments was the launch of the Social Alliance for Accelerating Transformative & High Impact Innovations (SAATHI) — a collaborative platform anchored by C-CAMP in partnership with GIAN. SAATHI is designed to connect grassroots and deep-tech innovators with academic institutions, research centres, incubators, investors, industry stakeholders, and government agencies.

With support from the Gates Foundation as this year’s funding partner, SAATHI aims to catalyze systemic innovation by enabling cross-sector partnerships, nurturing bold ideas, and helping solutions move from concept to implementation. It seeks to bridge the gap between idea and impact — addressing bottlenecks across different stages of the innovation value chain.

The founding partners of SAATHI include BITS Pilani, RCB Bionest, IIT Bombay, AMTZ, KIIT, Venture Centre, and Social Alpha — together forming a first-of-its-kind national ecosystem committed to driving high-impact innovation for India’s development.

The 2025 edition of the People’s Festival of Innovation reaffirmed one message loud and clear: when grassroots creativity and deep-tech capability come together, the future becomes not just imaginable — but achievable.