If there are pluses in pursuing jugaad as an innovative approach, the flip side of maneuvering obstacles has its moments of shame too!
It goes without saying that most Indians are culturally wired to solve problems. There is a seemingly inbuilt cognitive ability in a large impoverished majority for jugaad, a quick-fix frugal innovation to wriggle out of any challenge. Does it not reflect peoples’ self-reliant optimism to confront challenges? It does, else multiple variants of ‘scare crow’ to protect mature crops would not exist, and neither would equally affordable mechanical improvisations like buttermilk churning washing machine and the motorcycle-cum- tractor. ‘Next to impossible is only possible’ has gone under their skin of people, turning every obstacle into an opportunity as if there is no tomorrow.
The search for a cheaper air conditioner by investigative journalist Dean Nelson, who spent few years in Delhi reporting for the London’s Sunday Times, led him on his jugaad journey which has been as much a celebration of inspiring resourcefulness of the poor as also a criticism on the absence of a formal system to optimize such talent. Not only did he discover the low-cost work-in-progress Snowbreezer, a device that generates cooling effect by passing air over an ice brick, which has yet to be perfected for wider adoption, but was surprised to learn that juggad mentality alone helped the country propel its spacecraft Mangalayam at less than the cost of the Oscar-winning Hollywood space thriller Gravity. Incidentally, neither of the two innovations are products of an economy that values and advances jugaad mentality.
However, it has yet to hamper the spirit of innumerable people who haven’t allowed poverty to get the better of their intellectual ability at solving problems. No surprise that there are innumerable inspiring tales of optimism amid scarcity and poverty that abound in everyday living of a largely impoverished society in the country. It is a blessing in disguise, as it has spurred creative improvisation for developing products and designing processes that are frugal, flexible, and democratic. From handy tips to improvised tools and from enhanced techniques to adaptive practices, there is a rich repository of innovations on offer.
While it remains intriguing what fuels innovative desire in ordinary people, equally compelling is the reason why such innovations are gifted, often anonymously, to the society at large?
In his jugaad journey, however, the author discovered that in addition to being inspiring and socially relevant the unending quest for frugal inventions has led people to bend the rules and beat the system all across. As scarcity is deeply ingrained in the psyche of people, they start looking for ways to bypass it rather than question the system that has led them to scarcity in the first place. From jumping queues to offering bribes, the ability to creatively manage obstacles by adopting quick-fix solutions has become a socially-accepted convenient way of life. If there are pluses in pursuing jugaad as an innovative approach, the flip side of maneuvering obstacles has its moments of shame too, asserts Nelson.
Should jugaad mentality be allowed to circumvent the system? As long as people continue to remain spaced by socio-economic disparities, the best chance for them to survive in such an ecosystem of challenges rests on them being relentless on jugaad. Since the existing system cannot accommodate all the innovations and transform them into entrepreneurs, a large number of those left unattended on the margins will need to pursue the survival options at their disposal. It may, therefore, be risky to paint the world of jugaad with a single brush.
Jugaad Yatra is an absorbing, revealing, and reflective journey on the resilience, individualism and resourcefulness of people which further indicts the government of its failure in the wake of people’s fierce survival instinct. The book is a tour d’Horizon of the enriching world of jugaad, from the dusty village roads in Yamunanagar to the swanky corporate arcades in Mumbai. It provides a snapshot into the world of frugal innovations that are finding their way into the mainstream albeit at a snail’s pace. For the country to tackle its growing socio-economic and political challenges over in the decades ahead, jugaad ought to feature in its list of prescriptions to circumvent many of its challenges.
Like the English traveler who, during the Mughal period, had recorded that ‘the natives are so full of ingenuity that they make any new thing by pattern how hard so ever it seems to be done,’ Nelson echoes that people in India have continued to be innovative, with inbuilt entrepreneurial ability to turn things around. This good news can be fully realized by institutionalizing ‘good jugaad’, by giving it a platform on which bottom-up innovations could be converted to address the mounting social, economic, and environmental challenges.
Jugaad Yatra
by Dean Nelson
Aleph, New Delhi
Extent: 175, Price: Rs 599
...the natives are so full of ingenuity that they make any new thing by pattern how hard so ever it seems to be done....
Rarely do these young men get noticed by pilgrims who throng the holy city of Haridwar for taking a dip in icy waters of the Ganga, and offer their obeisance by throwing coins in it. What is salvation for some is sheer survival for the others. Holding a transparent glass pane and standing through the day in water, these men search for coins that lie at the bottom of the flowing river. By pressing the glass pane against the turbulent flow the coins lying at the bottom get clearly located. Fluid dynamics they would not have even heard of but they know the value of the idea that has eased their lives. Ask them, and they won’t even know who has been behind this innovation.
This is one amongst innumerable innovations that abound in everyday living of a largely impoverished society in India. From handy tips to improvised tools and from enhanced techniques to adaptive practices, there is a rich repository of innovations on offer. Think of the multiple variants of ‘scare crow’ to protect mature crops or the ‘belled rat’ that drives away others of its species. Even the buttermilk churning washing machine and the motorcycle-cum- tractor have been locally evolved, to make life easier for million others. What fuels innovative desire in ordinary people, and why are such innovations gifted anonymously to the society at large?
There could be many explanations for this. Simply put, improvisation is the mother of survival and a lost opportunity remains an unforgiveable waste. Resource constraint is viewed as a challenge by the poor, firing imagination in the most ordinary of minds. As a result, people do not succumb to the constraints but transcend them by improvising on inputs and reducing costs. An English traveler during the Mughal period had recorded that ‘the natives are so full of ingenuity that they make any new thing by pattern how hard so ever it seems to be done.’ It will suffice to say that an Indian is inherently an entrepreneur and willingly a devotee, nurturing a DNA of innovation for the larger good of the society.
Yet, in the welter of contradictions it may be risky to paint a nation of people with a single brush. By default people are innovative but they are spaced by socio-cultural differences, and thrive in diverse ecosystems of challenges and opportunities. Few ecosystems mould some of them into entrepreneurs, while a large number is left unattended on the margins. In his quarter century of efforts at documenting and celebrating informal knowledge produced at the grassroots, Anil Gupta displays a seriousness of purpose in fostering voluntarism to scout innovations from the grassroots. Else, the double-decker root bridge from Meghalaya, an efficient brick kiln from Andhra Pradesh, an innovative tree climber from Kashmir, and the bamboo windmill for water lifting from Gujarat would not have earned social recognition.
Grassroots Innovation chronicles the personal journey of the author in building an institutional architecture that has ensured respect, recognition and rewards for unsung innovators spread across the country. Each of the more than 200,000 ideas, innovations and knowledge practices have been registered at the National Innovation Foundation (NIF), set up by the Government of India. Out of the registered innovations, NIF has filed for more than 730 patents and about two dozen plant variety protection applications on behalf of the grassroots innovators.
What began as a voluntary effort through the Honey Bee Network has grown vertically; the process of translating an innovation into a good or service that creates value for the inventor through the payment it may receive from the potential customers has been set in motion. Though the process has been carefully designed, it seems these are still early days for the entire value chain to be fully operational. Part of the problem rests in keeping the cost and also the supply chain of these easy-to-use innovations frugal. One may baulk at this characterization but it does throw up a challenge more for the promoter of innovation, than the innovator himself. After all, grassroots innovators have rarely been inventing products or processes for the market.
The overtly interpretive acrobatics by the author in lending philosophical perspective to the social capital of grassroots innovations has reduced an interesting narrative into an exercise in theorizing the sociology of innovative culture. It raises more questions than what the author had set out to address. If the resource constraints give wings of imagination to the impoverished for being innovative, will connecting them to the marketplace of opportunity not curtail their inherent freedom of expression? What is the relationship between the idea of freedom at the grassroots and the rational for institutionalizing marketable perfection out of it? In the end, are the high ideals of an innovative culture need to be tagged to a monetary value outside the society that nurtures it? It could be anybody’s guess if creating a marketable opportunity for grassroots innovations can nurture the backend ecosystem to continue generating useful ideas.
Aamir Khan’s 3 Idiots had scored brownie points in using some of these innovations in challenging a system of education that nurtures clones of a kind. In contrast, Anil Gupta’s Grassroots Innovation struggles to bring clarity between thoughts and reality. Yet, it gives a tour d’Horizon of the enriching world of grassroots innovations. Part illuminating and part preachy, the lengthy narrative can be tough going for readers unfamiliar with the subject. It nonetheless throws light on some unusual questions on and about the mainstream knowledge economy.
Grassroots Innovation
by Anil Gupta
Penguin Books, New Delhi
Extent: 381, Price Rs. 599
This was first published in the Hindu BusinessLine weekend magazine Blink on Sept 23, 2017.
