Who Is Smital Dhake? British-Indian Data Scientist Wins UK Rail Award

A British-Indian data scientist hailing from a small town in Maharashtra is an "enormous inspiration" for women thinking of pursuing careers in STEM, as Smital Dhake from Jalgaon, India, became the first-ever data scientist to receive an award at the Britain Rail Wire Staff Award.

26-year-old Smital pursued her BE in Electronics and Technologies from SavitriBai Phule University of Pune and pursued an IET Diploma. She also attended Watford Grammar School in England before her BE degree and later pursued an MS in Robotics from King's College London. 

British-Indian Data Scientist Won UK Rail Award

A British-Indian data scientist from Jalgaon, Maharashtra, Smital Dhake, has been awarded the best Newcomer of the Year category award from the UK's RaiStaff Award of 2023 in the ceremony held in Birmingham last month.

With just 18 months of working with the mobility giant Alstom handling Britain's railways, Smital Dhake is the first and only data scientist in the company working as the AI Control Engineer. 

The 26-year-old techie working in the Alstom Hatfield office in eastern England said her inspiration has always been her grandparents, who she has seen working hard, which has fueled her ambition to keep developing her skills and apply them to develop engineering technologies. 

Dhake joined Alstom Digital and Integrated System (D&IS) UK to signal business to work on the Modular Advanced Route Settings (MAR-S) at the company's Hertfordshire base, which is working on using real-time data to predict future conflicts, enabling quicker decisions to resolve train movements and improve issue resolution efficiency.

The Designer Group Manager of the organisation, Mifaz Miftha, described Smital as a fast learner who always seeks knowledge and grows herself in exponential ways.

He continued to talk about Dhaka and how she uses her personal time to visit numerous schools promoting careers in engineering and sustainability, describing her as an "enormous inspiration" for young girls pursuing a STEM career. 

Who Is Smital Dhake?

The 26-year-old high-achieving engineer is an Indian-origin girl born in Jalgaon, Maharashtra. For a brief time, as per the LinkedIn details of Dhaka, she studied at the Watford Grammar School for Girls in England and graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Technologies in 2019 with a distinction from SavitriBai Phule University of Maharashtra, India. 

While Dhaka also holds a diploma in IET, she pursued a Master's in Science in Robotics from King's College, London, right after her graduation and passed her master's with distinction as well before she was awarded the Duke of Edinburgh Award.