The Rajiv Gandhi Sanganak Sarathi Awards for young IT leaders who made an impact globally, were given away at a function held at S M Joshi hall by Padmashree Dr Vijay Bhatkar, recently.

This is the fifth year of these awards. The awardees were Dr Uma Ganesh (CEO, G.I.T.), Abhi Gholap (CEO, Optra Systems Pvt. Ltd.), Harshit Desai (CMO, Pune IT), Rahul Kaul (CEO, Infotech NetAlia) and Sashikant Mohile (CMD, SQTL). They were chosen for their excellent work in the field of IT.

Special awards were given to Anand Bhalerao, director, Bharti Vidhyapeeth and Dr Khullar for their contribution in spreading awareness about IT education in slums. Present on the occasion were Dr Ganesh Natrajan, former president NASSCOM, IT expert Deepak Shikarpur and founder-chairman of Sarathi NGO Shankar Kalmani. "In this IT world, it has become very important to imbibe other skills also. If we could solve basic problems of slums, literacy, un-employment and development of villages, then only we can become a super power country," said Bhatkar.

"Global recession is a big opportunity and youngsters should learn to tackle such situations and find out solutions for the same," added Bhatkar.

Natrajan said, "The contribution and guidance of the University of Pune and Bharti Vidyapeeth is immense. After Mumbai and Pune, Nashik is fast developing into an IT hub, which is going to add to the development of IT sector as a whole."