The hackathon will start on May 12, 2022, and will run till May 31, 2022. 

Open only for students in the South zone, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana.

It also allows the students to represent their college in an interstate competition and win prizes worth INR 50K.

​​Crack this Business Problem:

Renting a house or an apartment is never easy. Whether you are a college student or a working professional, renting a place always seems like a daunting task that is often impulsive or risky. Rent is influenced by several factors. 

In this challenge, participants need to use data science methods, machine learning, and hyperparameter tuning to predict house rents. 

Eligibility Criteria:

• The participants must be pursuing the following degree programs

• BTech/ BE- All streams
• BSc/ MSc
• BCA/ MCA
• MTech

• The college/ university must be based in the South Zone (Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana)
• Valid ID card from the respective college/ University
• Participants can compete as individuals or in teams of two.

Dataset details 

• Train.csv – 1,34,683 rows x 21 columns
• Test.csv – 57,722 rows x 20 columns 
• Sample Submission.csv — Please check the ‘Evaluation’ section on MachineHack website for more details on generating a valid submission

Data description:

• Property ID 
• Room
• Layout type 
• Property type 
• Locality 
• Price 
• Area 
• Furnish type 
• Bathroom 
• City 
• Parking spaces 
• Pet-friendly 
• Power backup
• Washing machine
• Air conditioner 
• Geyser/solar
• Security deposit 
• Neighbourhood 
• CCTV/security  

What are you competing for?

• Cash prizes worth Rs. 50 K up for grabs – to be shared among the top three teams.

• All teams that complete the challenge will get participation certificates

• First Prize: INR 25,000
• Second Price: INR 15,000
• Third Prize: INR 10,000

Disqualification

• The championship will be open only to a student from the South zone, i.e., Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana.
• If any of the details entered are found incorrect, Analytics India Magazine and Praxis reserve the right to disqualify any participant.
• Any external dataset usage is strictly prohibited. The participants will be disqualified if found using any external dataset.

Submission guidelines: 

• Sklearn models support the predict() method to generate the predicted values.
• The participant should submit a .csv file with 57,722 rows with 1 column [“price”]. The submission will return an Invalid Score if you have extra rows or columns.
• The file should have exactly 1 column.

Note: 

• Do not shuffle the sequence of the test series
• If you are using pandas, use this submission code:

submission_df.to_csv(‘my_submission_file.csv’, index=False)

Evaluation criteria: 

• The submission will be evaluated using the RMSE metric. One can use ‘np. sqrt (Mean Squared Error)’ to calculate the same. [mean_squared_error(y_true, y_pred, squared=False)]
• This hackathon supports private and public leaderboards.
• The public leaderboard is evaluated on 30 per cent of test data.
• The private leaderboard will be made available at the end of the hackathon, evaluated on 100 per cent of the test data.
• The Final Score represents the score achieved based on the best score on the public leaderboard.

Championship Timeline

• May 12, 2022: Data Science Student Championship – South Zone Challenge begins. 

Phase #1: 

• The participants download the dataset, solve, and submit their solutions on the MachineHack platform.

Phase #2: 

• The Leaderboard is frozen with the Top 50 teams on May 31, 2022. 
• The Top 50 will need to submit a presentation on their problem statement analysis, solution approach, business outcome, and real-world impact by June 06, 2022.
• The Final Top 6 teams will be selected on the basis of their Leaderboard position and the quality of the presentation by June 10, 2022. 
• The Top 6 need to work on bench data released and prepare for the final jury round.

Phase # 3:

• The Top 6 teams will arrive in Bangalore city on June 22, 2022, to present their final solution for the Final Jury Round. 
• The top three winners of this Data Science Student Championship – South Zone Challenge will receive the cash awards.
• All Top 6 finalists will receive commendation certificates. 

The winner will be judged on the following in the final jury round:

• 30% Statistical and ML Algorithm
• 30% Innovation + Creativity
• 20% Business Outcome/ Impact
• 20% Presentation + Communication

Other details: 

Here is some of the important information regarding participation in the final jury round by the Final Top 6 teams:

• Teams will be given return bus/ train tickets from the nearest metro city of their residence. Please note that meals during the journey will not be included in the ticket, and any expenses towards the same need to be borne by the travelling teams.
• The shortlisted teams will need to manage and bear travel expenses, logistics, etc., between their residence and the bus/ train station of the nearest metro city from where they need to board/ alight from the bus/ train.
• We will not be responsible for the accommodation of the shortlisted teams or any fellow co-passengers who may accompany the shortlisted teams.
• Food and beverages will be arranged for the shortlisted teams on the day of the jury round at the contest venue.
• Only the shortlisted teams will be provided entry to the jury round to be held in Bangalore and during the time mentioned in the session schedule.
• All communication and queries are to be made only to the contact details provided on the MachineHack platform.