He is all of 24, but Bengaluru boy Anirudh Sharma is already making news across the globe. He has been chosen as the Innovator of the year by MIT Technology Review. India TR35, is an award that recognises youngsters below 35 who are innovating in the field of technology.

Ask him about his innovation and a shy Anirudh says, “I didn’t think it would become such a big thing.” Called Le Chal (or take me), Anirudh has created haptic shoes for the visually-impaired. In simple terms, these shoes will guide a blind person to his destination without any external help. The vibrations emanating from the shoes will help the wearer with directions.

For Anirudh, who has worked on various innovations, working on this idea, happened by chance. “There is a blind school close to my house in Koramangala. That’s when I observed blind people depending on others for regular activities like getting to a bus-stop and crossing the road. Those images remained in my memory,” says Anirudh, whose moment of Eureka occurred last January.

“It happened within six days. I thought of it one afternoon and started working with my mobile phone’s vibrator and my shoes. I nailed the idea on the sixth day into a prototype,” says Anirudh excitedly. Once he posted the diagrams on his blog and a write-up, it was history. He was bombarded with calls and most tech magazines published his report.

After the success of his experiment, Anirudh’s life changed. “So far, innovating was just for fun. But when I saw that so many people needed it, I turned entrepreneur, thinking this is my one chance to help,” says the youngster. “We all are disabled some way or another, I wanted to help the visually impaired and never thought of an award for it,” confesses Anirudh. Now Le Chal has been sent to Ahmedabad to develop the final product.

Anirudh runs his own company Ducere Technologies and also works with various MNCs as a research consultant.

So what next? He says, “Technology is fun but is misunderstood as boring. I want to change that mentality by working on exciting innovations that will excite people and will be useful. As a child I craved for toys. But the supply never met my demands. It is an itch to play with toys that makes me work on fun ideas. Now I am a big guy and want to create bigger toys and play with them.”