Code for India Announces "Code for a Billion" -- A 90-Day Agentic-AI Impact Hackathon to Launch on India's 80th Independence Day

VMPL
New Delhi [India], August 14: Code for India (CFI), the civic-tech nonprofit dedicated to empowering engineers and changemakers to build technology for public good, today announced "Code for a Billion -- Bharat Agentic-AI Hackathon 2026," a 90-day, fully virtual, impact-focused hackathon to be launched on 15 August 2026, India's 80th Independence Day.
The hackathon will run from 15 August 2026 through 15 November 2026. Winners and prize recipients will be announced on 5 December 2026 based on deployed projects running on any cloud. Participants can register at codeforindia.org/hackathon and build their projects inside AgentFoundry.me, the official AI-native IDE powering the event.
On this launch Karl Mehta, Founder, Code for India, said, "Over the past decade, thousands of volunteers have answered the call to serve since our inaugural hackathon with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Sundar Pichai at Google. Today, we are channeling that same spirit into 90 days of actual impact -- not just development. Code for a Billion is about turning India's AI potential into deployed solutions that improve real lives."
Nasscom and Sector Skills Council (SSC) Nasscom's FutureSkills Prime have joined as founding knowledge partner and Skilling partner respectively, helping ensure the hackathon reaches engineering students, early-career developers, and aspiring AI builders across India.
Dr. Abhilasha Gaur, CEO, Sector Skills Council Nasscom, said, "India's demographic dividend is also its digital dividend. Initiatives like Code for a Billion give young developers a real-world platform to move from learning AI to building agents that solve problems at scale. Nasscom and SSC Nasscom's FutureSkills Prime are proud to support this effort as founding knowledge and skilling partners, because the future of India's tech leadership will be written by those who can apply AI responsibly, inclusively, and for impact."
Every participant who signs up on AgentFoundry.me will receive 1 million free smart-code tokens to prototype, collaborate, and deploy agentic applications. Teams can invite collaborators directly inside the IDE, making the event accessible from anywhere in India or across the globe.
Projects will be judged on real-world deployment, impact, and technical execution. Prize details will be announced on 5 December 2026, with recognition for the most impactful agentic solutions.
Teams may build agentic AI solutions across the following impact tracks:
* Education & Literacy -- personalized tutors, language access, and learning agents
* Health & Wellbeing -- preventive care, rural health access, and mental wellness agents
* Climate & Sustainability -- environmental monitoring, agriculture, and clean-tech agents
* Governance & Civic Tech -- public service delivery, transparency, and citizen engagement
* Financial Inclusion & Economic Opportunity -- agents for livelihoods, MSMEs, and accessibility
The initiative is supported by founding knowledge and skilling partners Nasscom and
SSC Nasscom's FutureSkills Prime, alongside Silicon Valley technical partners AgentFoundry.me, TrustModel.ai, and XSpan.ai.
2026 also marks Code for India's 10th year of service. Since its founding, CFI has grown into a strong, volunteer-driven community of 5,000+ technologists across the United States and India, united by the mission to "think local, hack global." The organization has supported open-source and civic-tech projects addressing education, health, disaster response, governance, and economic opportunity for underserved communities in both countries.
About Code for India
Code for India is a nonprofit civic technology organization with the mission to think local, hack global. Through volunteer-driven engineering, open-source development, and AI innovation, CFI empowers technologists to build solutions that improve lives across India and the United States.
About AgentFoundry.me
AgentFoundry.me is an AI-native development environment that lets builders create agentic applications, collaborate with teammates, and deploy to any cloud. It is the official build platform for Code for a Billion 2026.
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