'The whole world is but one family' - Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan Australia

April 2010 Vol. 7 No. 10
Backyard Innovations
Three Idiots, the immensely entertaining
Bollywood movie, was a super-hit. Though
certain sections were impractical, on the whole
the film was enjoyable --- and it also made a very valid
point: the Indian education system encourages rote
learning and puts little premium on actual learning.
The film, directed by Rajkumar Hirani, also stressed
on the significance of low-cost, backyard innovations
like the ones that were developed and marketed by
the protagonist of the movie, Rancchoddas ‘Rancho’
Shyamaldas Chanchad aka Phunsukh Wangdu.
To drive home the point about innovations, the film
used low-cost gadgets made by backyard innovators.
The brains behind the innovations in Three Idiots were
Remya Jose, a student from Kerala, who created the
exercise-bicycle-cum-washing-machine, Mohammad
Idris, a barber from Meerut district in Uttar Pradesh,
who invented a bicycle-powered horse clipper, and
Jahangir Painter, a painter from Maharashtra, who
made the scooter-powered flour mill.
Even though India’s education system does not
encourage innovators, the country has a thriving
network of backyard innovators. Unfortunately they
get very little support from the government and the
private sector. “In 2000, the total fund available for
the National Innovation Foundation was Rs 1.6 crore.
Ten years down the line, it’s still the same,” says
Prof Anil K Gupta, Executive Vice Chair, National
Innovation Foundation (NIF). The Department of
Science and Technology, Government of India, set
up the Foundation in 2000 for “scouting, spawning,
sustaining and scaling up grassroots green innovations
and helping their transition to self-supporting
activities”. Even though NIF funds have not increased,
the number of innovations has gone up considerably
in the last 10 years. In 2000, NIF had a database of
10,000 innovations; today it has 1,40,000.
- KumKum Dasgupta*
But do we need
these innovations?
Do they serve any
purpose? Prof Gupta,
who also the runs the
Honeybee network
of innovators, says:
“These backyard
i n n o v a t i o n s
are important
for inclusive
d e v e l o p m e n t ,
a f f o r d a b l e
technologies and easy-to-repair products”.
Backyard innovators face myriad problems: first, there
is no research and development support for testing
their products; second, the technology testing fees are
same for individual innovators and private companies;
and third, there is no support for demonstration and
advertisements. “Why can’t public channels like
Doordarshan and All India Radio, both run by the
government, advertise these products,” asks Gupta.
The other problems innovators face are: designing and
product development and capital investment to scale
up their production.
“Under the member of Parliament Local Area