|
|
Honey bee publish details |
| More
Information |
|
|
|
|
| Category |
Awardees |
|
|
| Title |
Making India Innovative |
|
|
| Details |
National Awards
Motek treadle press
Mr Satish Deb (28) is a young man from a modest but tight-knit family. He learned about various aspects of the printing process from the treadle printing press kept at his home.
In his efforts to save his family’s printing press business from obsolescence, Satish has developed a technology that has the potential to rejuvenate treadle printing presses, which were losing ground to computers and new high quality printing technologies. Motek is a low cost, cutting-edge, up gradation tool for old printing machines. The innovation lies in the unique combination of screen printing with letter press machines. The cost of the retrofitted Motek India Treadle press is much lower than that of buying a new offset printing press. Further, it prints over five times more efficiently than the treadle press alone.
Mobile operated switch
Prolific innovator Mr Prem Singh (28) is a very precocious young man and had already stopped his formal education to focus on inventing by the time he turned 14. His mobile phone operated On/Off switch can operate any remote electrical device. This innovation enables farmers to know of the electricity supply status and remotely switch on or off the pump, as required, freeing them to move as they please. This technology is low cost and has many other applications. It was short listed for Asian Innovation Awards by Asian Wall Street Journal in 2006.
(Also see: HB, 17(1) & (2): 5-8, 2006)
Security Alarm system: From many to many (m2m), and one to many(o2m)
MrMohammad Aminuddin Ahmed (30) has always been interested in modifying machines and inventing new devices. As a boy, he developed an efficient pounding machine to replace the conventional “Dheki” and he honed his technical skills in his brother\s refrigerator repair shop.
Aminuddin, a contractual electrical repairman at ONGC, was approached by the security guards who were looking for a way to communicate with each other over the deafening noise of their oil drilling machinery. In his system, an alarm signal from a sub-station goes not only to the control room but also to all other sub-stations and to a remote speaker. The control room can also give an alarm signal to all sub-stations and to a remote speaker with the press of a single ‘Alarm to All’ switch. The novelty of this cost effective and reliable innovation lies in its ability to control “one to one” and “one to many” emergency communication channels with built in loops for signaling from sub-station to main station and vice versa. ONGC has already installed many such systems and are quite happy to have an enhanced security system in place.
Automatic saree border weft insertion: Combining tradition with modern
During his childhood, Mr P L Bhanumurti (50) and his family constantly struggled to make ends meet by weaving sarees. As an adult, He devoted his career to improving handloom systems and making weaving a profitable endeavor.
Traditional Korvai or ‘contrast’ weaving involves intricate work where the design and the colour of the borders are often different from those of the main body of the sari. Three shuttles are needed: the weaver operates two, and an assistant operates the third. Mr Bhanumurti’s automated system is derived from the “Catch Cord Technique drawing device for looms” (United States Patent 4616680, 1984) so that no assistant is needed and the productivity is increased. He has already installed one such device in Madurai district and trained about 15 women weavers with the help of SEVA.
Continuous weft feeding looms
Mr Shanmugam (26) is in the third year of a Diploma course in textile technology specialising in weaving at SSM Institute of Textile Technology, Tamil Nadu. His inspiration for innovation comes from his desire to improve the livelihood of his traditional weaving community. He is one of those rare cases where a textile college admitted him directly in second year looking at the quality of his innovation as a school student.
Mr Shanmugam first observed the time and manpower wasted in changing the pirn windings of power looms while working in his uncle’s power loom centre. To address this problem, he built a modification to the shuttle loom that continuously inserts weft without frequent pirn change. In this new method, two weft cone stands are placed at the sides of the loom, and are specially arranged so that they can control yarn tension and electronic weft stop motion. This inexpensive and easy to maintain system increases productivity by 15-20% and increases fabric quality and reduces labour need.
Overcoming disability: Improving car’s accessibility
Mr Mujib Khan (33), an automobile mechanic, has limited functioning in his legs as a result of an attack of polio in his childhood. He lives with his wife and four children and has never let his disability stop him from living a productive life. He is constantly searching for ways to retain his independence and inspire other handicapped people to live with self-respect.
His quest to make a vehicle accessible to handicapped drivers started with tinkering with his parent’s Maruti van in secret. The innovation lies in the modification to the accelerator, brake and clutch arrangement so that the controls are transferred to hand by use of leverage, wires and linkage mechanism. Comfort, simplicity and ease of operation are the other features embedded in the controls, and drivers without disabilities can also operate the vehicle in a conventional fashion.
Mr Mujib has retrofitted over 70 vehicles in this fashion to date.
Whole stalk paddy thresher
Late inventor Mr Dilip Singh Rana is remembered as a natural leader who was constantly searching for ways to make life easier for farmers, never thinking of asking for financial support or recognition in return. He is survived by his wife, three daughters and a son.
He developed a new type of paddy thresher, where the stalk of the paddy is not broken during the threshing process. Apart from matching the local practice of feeding animals with whole stalk, it makes a very good raw material for the paper industry. Traditionally paddy is threshed by beating followed by winnowing and cleaning by the fan. But this process is labor intensive and time consuming. Mr Rana’s invention is perhaps the first mechanized thresher that operates on
this principle and retains the whole stalk.
Shaving, cutting and grinding: Three innovations for sugarcane farmers
Mr Ganesamurthy Asari (47) was born and raised in a sugarcane-farming district. He runs a tractor repair shop and is very keen to develop practical, low-cost solutions for the problems faced by the farmers in that area.
He has developed three useful implements to help sugarcane farmers. The first invention is a tractor operated stubble shaver which enables farmers to cut stubble closer than possible with the conventional swinging blade models. The second is a power tiller operated tubble shaver that operates in a manner similar to the tractor-based model described above. The last innovation is a sugarcane trash grinder that crushes wastes to particles ranging in size from 2-20 mm, increasing the speed of the composting process and preparing easily digestible fodder for animals.
White Flowers: Mighty powers of new cardamom variety
Mr K J Baby (66) lives with his wife, daughter, and three sons on a profitable twenty-acre farm on which they raise cardamom. His entire family has supported and assisted him in his plant breeding efforts.
Mr Baby has developed a white flowered variety of cardamom which has higher yield, oil content, and recovery ratio than the locally popular varieties. The variety can be grown effectively in waterlogged soil and shady conditions. Other features include robust tillers and a deeper root system, making it more resistant to various biotic and abiotic stresses. Mr Baby has been recognized by the Indian Institute of Spice Research for his breeding skills and his variety is being grown in farms across Kerala, Karnataka, and Tamil Nadu. Despite all this, humility is writ large on his face always.
Hardening, fertilizing plants and deepening roots: Papachchan style of pepper cultivation
Mr Papachchan (51) was forced to leave his ancestral village Chakatabara, Kerala after an attack of root blight decimated his crops. He is currently producing pepper and rubber at his small landholding.
Papachchan’s inherently fertile land with adequate natural drainage is an ideal site for organic pepper cultivation and his innovative agronomic methods only serve to increase his success. His style of production requires no tillage and little irrigation, and increases the plant’s resistance to foot rot and produces double the yield of the conventional methods.
State awards
Can you dare to dream of crossing the English Channel on cycle: Chaurasiya can
Mr Dwarka Prasad Chaurasiya is now in his mid seventies, but he has not yet lost his passion for inno-vation. He demon-strated his prowess by bicycling in sea from Nariman point to Chaupati more than two decades ago. He has also walked on water with floating shoes with a near religious zeal, pushing himself to the edge of his physical, emotional and financial capabilities.
The amphibious cycle and shoes can help not only in removing aquatic weeds, but also in vending provisions to communities living around water bodies, have new water sports and drag things in water bodies. Mr Chaurasiya’s water walking shoes are made of a lightweight material, thermocol. The shoes, which provide sufficient buoyancy and maneuverability are three feet long, 10-inches wide, and 8 inches thick. He can inspire young and old with his vivacity and commitment to pursue his dreams.
Wonder cardamom- a new variety of cardamom
Mr Sabu Varghese is a marginal farmer growing cardamom, pepper, rubber, cloves, vanilla, coconut and bananas in his five acres farm. While dabbling with cardamon, he observed one plant was morphological distinct from the others in the plantation. This plant was tall and bore numerous long tillers, branched panicles, and significantly bigger capsules.He grew a seedling from one ripe capsules of this plant in 1992, and offsprings turned out to be very robust and healthy bearing bold capsules. He has distributed around 50,000 plants to thousands of farmers in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
High yielding groundnut variety “Moralo”
Now in his seventies, Mr Thakarshi Savaliya has been farming since he discontinued his studies in class four. He grew up following the footsteps of his father to become a successful farmer and gain the respect of his neighbors and peers.
Mr Thakershibhai is known throughout Junagadh as the father of the ‘Moralo’ groundnut, popular for its sweetness, productivity and resistance against the ‘Tikka’ disease. In 1988, while weeding and interploughing, Thakarshibhai and his son, Nitin noticed two plants that stood out from the rest. They were greener, their leaves were thicker, and they bore more flowers and pods. These plants were marked and stored by Thakarshibhai for seeds. He propagated the seeds separately each year, noticing that the crop matured in only 90 days, a month before the regular variety. He named his groundnut variety “Moralo” because the pods resemble a peacock in shape.
Rashidpura: An improved variety of onion
Mr Manaram Chaudhary (72) has been farming for the last fifty years. For the last 32 years, he has also been growing onion.
Water shortages in the Sikar region inspired Mr Chaudhary to breed a variety that would require less irrigation. After much experimentation, he has developed a highly productive, early maturing, and drought resistant variety of onion that has become famous across the northern states of Haryana, Delhi, and Rajasthan for its delicious taste. This white onion variety is called Rashidpura.
Student’s awards
Breaking boundaries: designing first five wheeled car
Young cousins Manoj (18) and Harimohan Saini (21) have designed and built a five-wheeled car in the hope of making a cheaper vehicle that most middle class Indians would be able to afford. They built the prototype using scrap materials such as scooter wheels, a moped engine, and a chassis built from available nickel pipes. The four front and rear wheels are fixed and only the fifth wheel in the center of the car is used in steering. Manoj and Hari Mohan estimate that when they fine-tune the design their car will be able to reach speeds as high as 80 km/hr and average fuel consumption of 75-80 km/l, more efficient than the 18-20 km/l rating of most available models.
Speed restricting device
Master P Krishnakant (16) is in class XIth. By class four, his mathematics and technical skills were so advanced that he joined an institute for a 45-day electronics course intended for students in class ten or above. Since then, he has developed many projects such as a hydroelectric power plant, a transistor radio, an invisible intruder alarm, and a light activated switch.
The inspiration for Krishnakant’s speed controlling device came from the high number of accidents caused by speeding in Kerala. This device is a microprocessor-based system, which limits the speed of a vehicle beyond a predefined value by restricting the fuel supply. When a driver increases his speed beyond a pre-set limit, he receives a warning from a buzzer unit and if he still persists, then the electronic valve blocks the fuel flow from the fuel tank to carburetor bringing down the speed. In the present innovation, an electronic solenoid valve is used, which has far greater precision and reliability than the mechanical based motor or actuator units fitted in conventional alternatives.
Solar laminator: Sun gives your documents a new life!!
Mr Amandeep Singh, a 21-year old student in his first year of graduation, developed a laminating machine that runs on solar energy when he was still in school. Amandeep is an avid member of Bharat Scouts and Guides, and has received recognition for his innovation at several fora.
The solar powered laminator operates using the same principle as a solar cooker, replacing the electrical heating filament inside the laminator with a black box surrounded with mirrors. The solar energy collected in the box heats the metallic plates that affix the lamination sheets to the desired document. The machine can laminate an A4 size document in 15 minutes on a sunny day and can be powered by electricity in the absence of sunlight. This solar laminator once modified, may help people across rural India with scanty access to electricity to preserve and protect their important documents.
Minding money and saving electricity: Reading meters in rupees
Master G Sathish Kumar (17) has been blessed with an insatiable curiosity since early childhood and has already received numerous awards and accolades for his innovations. He is currently in the first year of his three-year Diploma course in Mechatronics from NTTF, SPIC Campus at Tuticorin.
He has an idea to develop electricity meters that display the amount of electricity consumed in terms of money (Rs) rather than power units (Kilowatt Hours). This innovation will encourage consumers to keep tabs on their energy expenditure and conserve power when possible. Satish also suggests enacting a “prepaid system” wherein customers buy power units at the beginning of the month and check their balance on the meter, reducing consumption or purchasing more energy units as necessary. This prepaid system will also benefit energy companies, which can easily cut off power supply as the balance on the SIM card runs dry and restore it when the card is renewed.
Multipurpose crutch for the physically challenged people
Master Rakesh Kumar Patra, a student of class Xth feels concerned about the plight of physically challenged people and hopes to use his creative capacity to improve their lives.
He has made a crutch equipped with a foldable seat, a head light, an alarm, and even a place to put an umbrella. Multipurpose crutch provides convenience and comfort for handicapped people. The crutch was made of a light wooden frame. This innovation reduces the drudgery of walking long distances using a crutch without taking a halt.
Tablets for boosting productivity of crops: Vermi-compost pellet making machine
Though Mr Nitin Kumar Tyagi (21) is still a young man, he has already had a productive inventing career. Nitin is now pursuing his BA and operating his own business, a computer shop.
A local farmer approached Nitin with the challenge of developing a vermi-compost pellet-making machine, and he is said to have completed a working model within a few months time. Vermi-compost is used as an organic fertilizer and there are very few machines available in rural areas to make the pellets. It is easy to handle and applies pellets rather than powder or slurry. The process involves mixing the vermi-compost with a suitable binder (molasses), keeping it in a hopper, carrying the compost using the conveyor belt on a flat bed in the form of a sheet and passing it through the pellet-making die to generate a stream of pellets. A similar pellet making system is common in the pharmaceutical industry but its agricultural application is novel.
An umbrella that rains and cools!!
Ms Supriya Chotrey (13) is currently studying in the eight standard. She was inspired to make an umbrella with a water sprayer during the extreme heat waves that struck Orissa in 2003. She consulted her science teacher and successfully built a unique umbrella with a water sprayer, a thermometer and a siren attached to the handle of the umbrella. The umbrella has an upper layer of white cloth, and a lower layer of black cloth. In between these two lies a layer of sponge. A water sprayer is attached to the handle of the umbrella. When the ambient temperature rises above 350C, the built-in thermometer signals the umbrella to sprinkle water from the attached spraying canister saturating the sponge.
(Also see: HB, 16(3):8-10, 2005)
Making sewage power light, charge groundwater
Master Moxad Pinakin Thaker’s (15) interest in innovation and learning began at the age of four when he fell off a balcony and injured his head. His parents provided him with books to read during his recuperation and he quickly became a voracious reader and an outstanding student.
Moxad feels that it is a terrible shame that sewage is viewed as a waste when it could potentially be an eco-friendly source of energy. He has worked on a comprehensive plan for using sewage for multiple applications and has built a scaled-down model. As per Moxad’s plan, the solid waste is first separated and used in a bio-gas plant while the filtered water is used to run a turbine coupled with a generator to produce electrical energy. Lastly, the water flowing from the turbines is partly issued for drip irrigation and partly for groundwater recharge. IARI is trying to test it.
Intelligent letterbox
Ms Utkalika Patnaik (16), a student of first year science at intermediate level, is an avid student and a classical singer. She has come up with an idea for a letterbox with an indicator light to inform of the presence of letter in the box. The intelligent post box consists of an electronic circuit, a letter receiving plate, which senses the fallen letter and triggers the circuit, along with green and red status indication lights. The “red light” flashes when the letterbox is empty and the “green light” flashes when a letter falls inside and actuates the plate.
(Also see: HB, 17(1) & (2): 37-38, 2006)
Water conservation system
Master Vishnu Bhachubhai Dumania (17) hails from the traditional salt manufacturing region of the Little Rann of Kutch and hopes to become a teacher one day. He is currently preparing for his second attempt at the secondary exams, having failed in maths and science on his first try, despite his obvious aptitude for innovations. Very few children of salt manufacturers in Kutch attend school because their families need them to monitor the water level in the water pumping tanks among other chores. Vishnu desperately wanted to attend school, so he attached a box with a rope to the wastewater discharge pipe. To the other side of the rope, he attached a stone with a weight equal to the weight of the box when it was full with water. When the water level decreases, the box becomes lighter and the stone at the other end moves down, automatically shutting off the motor when the water level becomes dangerously low. The design has become popular amongst many salt-making families in the area.
Weighing machine using scooter tyres
Ms Sarit Swapna Das (13) is currently studying in eighth standard at her village high school and hopes to become a cardiologist one day. She has great love for her village and draws her inspiration from her father and teacher.
Swapna observed that farmers without a cheap and reliable system to weigh their produce were at a disadvantage as they were often cheated by rigged scales. In response to this problem, she built a simple weighing device from a used scooter tyre which can weigh up to 25 kilograms. The scale consists of the inner tube of a scooter tyre filled with air, and is connected through the air-valve to a transparent plastic tube filled with red colored water and a calibrated vertical display. As weights are placed on top of the tyre, the compression pushes air through the valve and displaces the colored water in the tube.
Smallest portable balance: 8.2 gm
Mr Rajkumar Soni (21) operates a small watch shop with his father and supplements his income with a jewellery making business, but his true passion is inventing.
Rajkumar was unable to afford the microbalance needed for production of gold jewellery, so he set about making his own microbalance. He spent six months and Rs. 10,000 developing it. The microbalance (made of silver) weighs only 8.2 grams, and weighs objects in the range of 20-2000 mg.
(Also see: Honey Bee, 17(1) & (2): 37-38, 2006)
Badminton stroke practicing Machine
Mr Subash Das learnt the value of hard work and creativity from his childhood job as a hotel boy. He has also designed and built a small car that runs on a scooter engine. His co-innovator Mr Amlan Bhattacharya represented Assam as a badminton player, and is now a coach at the National Institute of Sports (NIS).
Inspired by existing automatic practice machines for cricket and tennis players, Mr Bhattacharya came up with the idea for a machine that would drop badminton shuttle-corks automatically. A player could hit the cork dropped by the machine with a racket without having to pick up the cork every time. Having no technical knowledge, he asked Mr Das to help him develop a prototype. Mr Das accepted the challenge and built a machine that works with a hard belt and pulley.
Consolation awards
Preventing accident at such a low cost: Side-stand gear lock system for Rs 20
Auto mechanic Mr K S Sudheer (45) has developed a side-stand gear lock system to prevent two-wheeler accidents. His love for solving technical problems contributed to his interest in automobiles and innovation.
Mr Sudheer was inspired to build this side-stand gear locking mechanism after he witnessed a terrible motorcycle accident. An entire family was badly injured when their motorcycle side-stand, which had not been pushed back when starting the vehicle, struck against an obstruction on the ground. Mr Sudheer’s retrofittable kit, costing just around Rs 20, consists of a clamp, which restricts the engagement of gears when the side-stand is not removed. The interlocking mechanism is simple, easy to assemble, and affordable. Currently, this kit is configured for some models of Bajaj and Hero-Honda bikes, and it is also being developed for other models.
Scooter based spray-painting device
Mr Sheikh Jahangir (48) has been running a small spray painting shop called ‘Khandesh Spray Painters’ for the past 18 years. His father, who was also a painter, taught him the skills of his profession.
Jahangir received many work orders to paint vehicles, but in order to complete the assignments in time, he often had to hire an electricity-based air compressor from another vendor, cutting into his profit. He was unable to buy his own compressor because of monetary constraints and a lack of electricity supply. In his search for an alternative, he developed a spraying kit mounted on a scooter, which powers the compressor with energy from the engine, thus making the unit completely mobile. The spraying unit consists of a one hp air compressor head and a cylindrical air tank to store the pressurized air. The power from the scooter engine is taken to the compressor head through a belt drive.
Windmill operated tube well
Mr Mohammad Mehtar Hussain (32) and his younger brother, Mushtaq (28) live in a joint family that grows mostly paddy on their two-acre farm. Though their family is poor, they are very close-knit and always supportive of one another.
Looking for a low-cost alternative to diesel or electric or manual way of pumping water into the fields for the winter crops, the brothers devised a simple windmill made up of bamboo and tin sheets. The brothers found that continuous pumping by hand involved a lot of effort and drudgery. Using diesel pumps was a big drain on their economic resources. While the working principle of the windmill is similar to conventional ones, the use of low cost, locally available material like bamboo instead of costlier metals for the framework and the direct drive to do automatic pumping of water from the tube well is the innovator's contribution. This innovative windmill is also inexpensive (less than Rs 4500) and portable.
Wind operated power generator
Mr Dineshbhai Ashodia (49) followed in his father’s footsteps by taking up welding and fabrication work. His love for developing new things has led him to develop his own games, solar cooker and solar water heater.
The sporadic supply of electricity in Ashodia’s hometown of Rajkot inspired his search for a new efficient power source. He observed that most windmills in Gujarat were only operational at minimum wind speeds of 7-8 km/hr. He decided to build a windmill that would work with a lower wind speed requirement. The highlight of his innovation is its ability to use the centrifugal force generated in the main power shaft using the governor to vary the gap between the stator and rotor elements.
“Chalakh” mango nipper
Mr Madhav Shrikrishna Mahajan (48) is a farmer, poet, and an advocate of organic agriculture. He is also engaged in fruit processing and runs an ayurvedic medicine production business with his brothers. He has been practicing and promoting organic farming for the past 12 years.
Orchard owners are constantly searching for the best way to efficiently harvest mangoes without damaging their petioles. Mr Mahajan has developed a lightweight modified nipper, consisting of twin replaceable cutting blades with a rubber stopper in the middle, mounted on a steel oval ring fitted with nylon mesh fruit-receiving basket. This design eliminates the danger of fruit falling to the ground and can deliver up to 300 fruits an hour. The nipper, which retails for Rs 105, can also be used in harvesting lemons, guava, oranges, and other tree fruits.
Multi-level-modified wood Stove
Mr Bharat Agrawat (40) has built many devices including a lemon cutter, an innovative windmill for lifting water from wells, and a 5 HP power tiller cum tractor, which can be rotated 3600. His environmental ethics influence his decisions to develop sustainable technologies.
Mr Agrawat noticed that traditional wood stoves, by virtue of their design, do not use the heat generated in the most efficient manner and generate smoke and pollutants due to incomplete combustion. Thus, he decided to build a stove with better heat utilization, allowing for sufficient airflow and the simultaneous heating of multiple vessels kept at different levels. The stove consists of three chambers; two burners for cooking and a geyser for heating water. Mr Agrawat has already sold a large number of his eco-friendly stoves to nearby families.
Chandra Prabha multipurpose farming device
Prolific innovator and farmer Mr Annasaheb Bhavu Udgavi (72) developed his Chandra Prabha Multipurpose Device in response to problems he faced in his sugarcane farm. He made a multipurpose machine that did multiple operations like stubble shaving, fertilizer drilling, and cultivation simultaneously. This device saves time, money, and effort while preserving the health of the soil by reducing the number of tractor passes needed. The machine costs Rs 40,000 and can be attached to a 30-40 hp tractor, weighs less than one the other multipurpose cultivators, and is said to be more efficient than existing models.
(Also see: Honey Bee, 8(4):5-6, 1997)
Centrifugal sprayer
Farmer cum labourer Mr Uppuluri Krishna (46) owns around one and a half acre of dry land and also works as a hired labor on other farms to supplement his income. Always a creative person and an avid student, he draws the inspiration for his innovations from the problems he faces on his farm.
Unsatisfied with the performance of his battery powered pesticide sprayer, Mr Krishna set about making an improved sprayer which could be operated manually. To this end, he built the centrifugal sprayer, where the liquid from a backpack-tank falls on a fast rotating fan resulting in a misty spray. When the user pumps the handle up and down, the motion of the lever is converted into the rotary motion of the fan. The chemicals then flow from the tank to the fan and are converted from droplets into fine mist by its centrifugal force. |
|
|
| Volume No. |
Honey Bee, 17(4) & 18(1): 8-16, 2006 & 2007 |
|
 
|
|
