14-year-old girl from Tiruvannamalai develops solar-powered ironing cart, wins Children's Climate Prize

Tuesday evening was special for Vinisha Umashankar of Tiruvannamalai, whose name was all over Twitter. The 14-year-old girl's innovative solar-powered ironing cart, which got her the prestigious Children's Climate Prize, drew appreciation from top names, including Anand Mahindra, chairman of Mahindra Group.

The business tycoon shared her video and tweeted, "Bravo Vinisha! Your project addresses a serious environmental problem, helps the self-employed and apart from being environment friendly, the mobile cart enhances revenue potential. @Velu_Mahindra can we give her the support of Mahindra Research Valley in all her future projects?"

Replying to it, R Velusamy, Senior vice-president, Head -Automotive Product Development of Mahindra Research Valley, tweeted,"Yes Anand. We will definitely do and reach out to her." A few weeks ago, Express had broken the story of Vinisha drawing international attention. "I think Mahindra Research Valley would be an ideal opportunity to scale-up the project. Vinisha has plans to improve the design and add more elements to the ironing cart to make it more feasible," said the girl's proud father, Umashankar.

A few companies have contacted her to build a full-fledged prototype of the solar ironing cart, but the deal is yet to be finalised, he added. "I am working on five more products like tapless handwash, converting plastic waste into insulated roofs etc, " said Vinisha.