To promote indigenous toy industry and reduce imports, the Centre has launched Toycathon-2021, a special kind of hackathon where students and teachers from schools and colleges, design experts, toy experts and start-ups will get together to crowdsource ideas for developing toys and games that are based on Indian culture, ethos, folklores, heroes and value systems.
The size of the toy market in India was about $1 billion but unfortunately 80 per cent of the toys were imported, according to an official release. The launch of Toycathon, is an effort to create an ecosystem for the domestic toy industry and the local manufacturers, tapping the untapped. The ‘Toycathon’ is based on nine themes including Indian culture, history, knowledge of India and ethos; learning, education and schooling; social and human values; occupations & specific fields; environment; divyang; fitness and sport; out of the box, creative and logical thinking and rediscovering/redesigning traditional Indian toys, the release stated. The ‘Toycathon’ will have three variants of tracks — Junior Level, Senior Level and Startup Level — and will allow participation of students and teachers from schools, colleges and universities, apart from start-ups and toy experts, the release said. Participants will have two options for idea submission. They can either submit ideas for the published problem statements or under novel toy concepts category.
