Research & Publications
Research & Publications
Mr. Dilip Rath, Chairman, National dairy Development Board and Chairman IRMA, Director IRMA, very distinguished guests, people involved in both NDDB and IRMA, dear students… It’s a pleasure to be here and I thank Prof. Bhatt for giving me this opportunity for this aspect of life for which I never really had an opportunity earlier, even though I see myself as one who is widely exposed to everything, having been connected to space, air views, defence technologies, CSR, GST etc. Yet I never had the opportunity connect to the earth to the extent of this institute. Besides, it is an honour to be here in the context of the great Milkman of India, Dr. Kurien and delivering a speech on his memorial lecture. The way he transformed society… a young man comes here, out of compulsion since the posting is part of his education. Then he gets stuck here, largely because he sees his mentors like Tribhuvandas Patel who was a legacy of this set-up coming from Sardar Patel… I shall not get into those details of which you are more aware than me. I am referring to a person, who had no relationship to this place but had to be here compulsorily as part of his training. He got attracted to a lucid cause. He was not engaged in rocket science but was, instead, doing his job sincerely by innovating management. He was truthful to his people, giving them confidence that society can be transformed through simple ways. The other thing that attracted me was his ability to adopt science and technology for very basic requirements of the country. Without this, he may not have succeeded. These are the attributes that we need to carry forward.
About rural India… by the way, I also come from a village… a small village in UP, which I left in 1960… from then on my connectivity has been very intricate. Yet through the years, from the 60s to the 90s, whenever I went back to my village, I would find that nothing had changed. All the changes have occurred only recently… over the last 10 years or so.
Here, we are talking of connectivity, of changes. Yet, even then: have we changed the quality of life in the village? Have we bridged gaps? My observation is that the gaps (regarding the quality of life) have only increased.
The question is: why are people running from villages to cities? The exodus is ever increasing. This is because we are not able to sustain quality in the villages. There could be many reasons but we can find solutions.
What exactly is rural management? In my perspective as a scientist, I ask: can we reduce the gap?
Travelling recently, I found myself in a remote place in Tamil Nadu. We stopped by at a roadside restaurant for some tea. We found that the waiters had come from the North East, from Assam; there was one from Tripura. I wondered why these people at such young ages had to come all the way to Tamil Nadu. Many labourers in Bombay come from Bihar or hilly areas. They live in substandard conditions because they do not earn much. Cheap labour in Bangalore and Delhi comes from these places. They live in substandard conditions, in slums, in these cities. They send money to their old parents and have barely enough for survival. You find their villages emptied of middle-aged and young men. This is a reality.
Why this is happening is that difference in the quality of life in the villages is actually increasing. Unless we provide change, we cannot talk of development. We have to see what it is that we need to do.
What we are talking about is the politics of the poor. Come election time and all political parties talk about the problems of the farmers, the poor, and the villagers. In spite of the matter figuring on the top of every political party’s agenda, the fact remains that the gap is increasing. As the long as this continues to happen, we shall not be able to solve the problem, only aggravate it. So, when we talk of development, we need to think of bridging this gap. And how are we addressing this? We are giving (the poor) free electricity for farming. Even in Delhi, people have been getting subsidized electricity and free water. This creates a dependent society. By providing freebies, we are killing the creativity of people and making mental slaves of them. This has been happening in cities as well.
Delhi has given a different kind of administration, something not understood by the people. As part of launching events at ISRO, I have visited a place called Kurung in French Guiana, in South America. It is a small island, still owned by the French. The local population comprises mainly black people who came from Africa two to three hundred years ago. The government gives sufficient money for doing nothing, so that the local population gets enough food. Education is compulsory up to school level. There is no encouragement offered for studying beyond literacy. As a result, these people either engage in mundane jobs or simply idle by the ocean, either fishing or simply doing nothing. Because of this, even today the French are able to rule that population. By doing this, people have turned into slaves with no aspirations. All the facilities, including food, are available with ease but there are nil aspirations. And this is what we are doing to our society, by providing free energy and water. We need to change this. This is where we need to recall what Dr. Kurien did. He enabled people to generate wealth. Even the MNREGA, which is such a prestigious programme of the government, is, in my view, the antithesis of what Dr. Kurien proposed as it encourages one not to do anything. If you look back, you may well ask the question: how did a country like our, with such strong roots and a great culture, came to be enslaved by a handful of people? This can happen if you get easily satisfied with what you have. If that is the case, then there is nothing else that you would want to do. There is aspiration to try out new things, engage in innovations or work hard. Add to that freebies and you kill all enthusiasm.
What then, is the way to development? We need to create the feeling that things must change. I often receive complaints from my contemporaries regarding the new generation that they are not satisfied. My question is: what is wrong with that? It is good not to be satisfied. It is good for the country, for them, and for us. We need to change the mindset.
To an extent, the Hon’ble PM Mr. Modi has realized that the solution lies in connectivity. In order to manage rural India, it is important to provide connectivity. That is now happening. Connectivity has to happen in 3-4 ways. Number one, you have to physically connect the roads. For connectivity to the cyberspace, electricity needs to be provided. The third thing is digital connectivity. This is about providing one megabyte connection to every person by 2022. There is a huge mandate to the DO department of Telecommunications, including providing backup. There is talk of 6-7 dedicated satellites coming up in the next two years with a high capacity targeting rural areas particularly including the north east and hilly areas where connectivity is unreachable. That kind of programme is also on; you will soon see a transformation. Connectivity gives you the means to do further. But then, you have to do a lot more after that. This is where the roles of scientists, innovations, and technology play an important part.
Connectivity is the first part. I am happy to state that connectivity is happening. Let us assume that in 2022, when all of rural India gets connected, we have to look at innovation. That is, innovation with respect to change in the quality of village life.
Innovation is taking place. Talking of the NIF, there are about four lakh innovations coming from the rural people. These have been accomplished by the rural people for the rural people. But then: where is the impact? There are innovators coming up with good innovations. The question is: how many people use those innovations?
Of the four lakh innovations, hardly one per cent gets used by the rural people. With an outreach of this nature, will the transformation required to bridge the gap in a powerful nation of this size be possible?
While the country is engaged in a large number of innovations, it does not figure in the top 100 of innovators. Going by per capita innovation we do not come even one per cent close to Sweden, which is the leader. Changing our thinking and being innovative is one part of the story. There is a saying that ‘in this century, you either innovate or perish.’
Innovation does not require a scientific basis. It is about adaptation.
There is only one area in which we are doing better than the rest: this is the IT sector. The good thing about this is that the young man involved in innovation can remain isolated. For everything else, one needs expertise in multi-disciplinary areas. This is where we are not too successful.
The late Dr. Abdul Kalam, if you remember, had started a programme named PURA to introduce amenities in the villages. But it did not take off. He started another programme HUTAI which, too, did not take off despite the money that was pumped in.
CSIR had started a programme which included technology for 800 million people whose average income was less than $2. The programme was rejected as it hardly created an impact.
In spite of trying, we do not see an impact. This is something we need to address. As a matter of fact, while going through the machinations of finding about NDDB, I found that this is the only place that connects with people (applause) and tries to bridge the gap.
There is another challenge. The secretary of our department is the member of our governing body. He was talking about having registered seventy to eighty thousand SMEs. All the SMEs are ready to take up activities, yet no one tells them what to do. So, there are problems, innovations, and SMEs. Yet there is no implementation. The SMEs do not know the problem. There is continuous disconnect everywhere in society. Connectivity needs to be multiplied.
Just think about this: How do we acquire smartphones costing Rs. 500? This is possible because of the quantities they are created in; it is because of the huge number of production. Surprisingly, supplies for our daily needs are coming from China. Including Ganesha items! The Chinese are able to produce them cheap simply because of the huge production numbers.
We need to understand the dynamics of production. Through low production (of innovations) costs cannot be reduced, nor can the masses be reached. The industry has to be prominent, besides technology adaptation. Most technologies are half baked.
I want to quote an example. I shan’t name the innovator but I know someone in Uttarakhand who has come up with an innovative way of producing electricity. Wanting to make his innovation more industry-friendly, he put together a team. He then realized that the technology he was using cannot, theoretically, be more efficient than 40 per cent. He developed a new technology that gave him 80 per cent efficiency. But he did not want to adopt it, despite our having tried to convince him over three months. He said that he felt “unprotected”. New technologies can be brought in, but if efficiency is 40 per cent, how can they work?
These so-called inventions are not really connected to the needs of villagers or society. Either we decide that technology is only for the city where industries are fully set up, or we decide that development is for the rural people. But these are wrong concepts. Why cannot those educated in IITs and ISBs carry out innovations for the rural people? Why is it thought that ‘frugal’ engineering must only be carried out in the villages? Systems need to be adapted. The concept of large production needs to be brought forward for the rural masses.
There is still another problem. How to retain youth in the rural area? One answer is enabling the rural through digital connectivity. But are we able to provide the same quality of life? I have asked this question many times.
In the US, about 15-12 per cent people work from home, particularly in the IT sector. They visit their offices as a matter of formality. This culture has been embraced by some IT companies in India, particularly in places like Bangalore where it takes two hours to travel 10 kilometres. If this can be done in Bangalore, why cannot this be done in villages? The mindset needs to get established. These are some of the thoughts on which we need to really work.
Rural management has changed from what it was 40 years ago. Rural management 40 years ago was synonymous with agriculture. In my perception rural management, today, is much larger than that. This has happened largely because today we live in a world that is connected.
As I had said earlier, by 2020 India plans to be as connected as elsewhere. We have both the means and ability to achieve this goal. While doing so, why should we see rural India as different from the cities? Can we provide this simple quality of life?
Let us talk of tele-medicine. Will people in the villages receive the same advice and support as in the city- that is the question. This can be done through video networking. This has been working on an experimental basis for almost 30 years now, if I am not mistaken. We started this programme in ISRO in 1995 or 1996. We have been working on it although it hasn’t caught up much.
Similar is the case with tele-education. This concept, too, was introduced by our satellite in 1999, I think. But it is yet to catch on. The challenge lies in creating the right kind of ambience. We need to bring in technology for the people.
Prof. Sarabhai gave a talk in Vienna in 1967. During that talk he was asked why India, which is a poor country, should go into space. He said, “If we have to play a role in the community of nations, we have to be second to none in the application of advanced technology, both for Man and society.” He added that we have no ambitions of going to the moon or other planets. Had Prof. been alive today, he would have changed that part of his statement! Obviously, the world has changed, its activities have changed, and we too have changed as a nation. We cannot remain in 1967 with respect to our aspirations. Yet his emphasis regarding ranking second to none in the application of advanced technology (both for humankind and society) is relevant today. This is needed in order to transform society. This can happen only by diverting one’s attention. While referring to rocket or space related technology we also have to see how it applies to the rural people. We are doing a pretty good job of it at ISRO but we need to do more. An example is crop assessment. This is done only through satellite technology. Diseases, too, get detected through satellite technologies in various areas. But the role needs to expand the technology.
We have a service in place called agro-meteorology. This tells us about the weather forecast for the next seven days, based on which we are able to advise farmers with regard to their activities. We are able to advise them about things like imminent rain so that they don’t sprinkle pesticides, which will wash away in the rain.
But now this needs to go further. Mere monitoring of weather conditions will not suffice. For the farmer, soil conditions are also important. The markets need is a parameter, for example. There are multiple parameters for that matter. Meteorology alone does not provide all the answers; the role of satellite technology is much larger. Technologies of various fields need to be included along with IT.
There is a major experiment on at Odisha, started by the Tatas initially. Teams are active in various districts. They have on their database the records of all the farmers with regard to information pertaining to soil conditions, nutrients, and so on. The idea is to monitor and advise these farmers, right from sowing and harvesting to post-harvesting, not to mention market reach. This is the kind of system that we need to adopt.
While talking of development and rural management, we need to bring technology closer to a much larger extent. That will bring about the required change. Not just IRMA, we also need to connect to larger institutes of this country. If we are able to achieve this goal over the next five to ten years, it will be both a tribute and service to Dr. Kurien.
Thank you very much!