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| CULTURE & SOCIETY |
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BOOK REVIEW |
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A celebration of jugaad that seems a bit over-the-top
By Manjula Lal
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Jugaad Innovation By Navi Radjou, Jaideep Prabhu and Simone Ahuja Random House 336 pp | Rs 499 |
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THIS TRIBUTE to Indian jugaad is subtitled ‘A frugal and flexible approach to innovation for the 21st century’. The dictionary meaning of the Hindi word jugaad means an innovative fix, an improvised solution born from ingenuity.
Based on painstaking first-hand research, this book was put together by three authors: Indian-born French national Navi Radjou, University of Cambridge professor Jaideep Prabhu and Simone Ahuja, who runs Blood Orange, a marketing and strategy consultancy headquartered in Minneapolis. The three will be in Delhi in June to promote the book. Ahuja’s TV series Indique — Big Ideas from Emerging India is what seems to have sparked the deep interest in jugaad, the most recent example of which is the ‘missed call’, but for most Indians will bring to mind the lassi mixed in washing machines and the motorcycle engine-powered cart or borewell.
The book is peppered with examples that the media has highlighted over the years, brought together within the covers of a book. So there is Mitticool, a clay fridge by potter Prajapati. There is a makeshift device to make a cycle run faster after it hits a pothole, designed by Kanak Das in the Northeast. Adversity offering opportunities, scarcity igniting passion — all these are worthwhile examples of jugaad. But the book itself has so many interesting inventions from other countries that one wonders why India is getting this pat on its back. And isn’t it a bit too late? When India was shining, that’s when the selfcongratulatory tone was needed. Now when the economy is drifting like a shipwreck, who is in the mood to marvel at the wonder that is Indian resourcefulness?
The basic idea of the book, besides celebrating the spirit of innovativeness, seems to be to tell the West that pouring resources into solving a problem is not the way forward. This seems a bit far-fetched and also pointless. If the West has resources, it is bound to use them, although it still needs to deploy them creatively. India too has reached a stage where it has enought resources now, and so the housewife who recycled plastic containers may now want to buy a shiny new set from a mall.
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What India needs
is not more jugaad but less aping of
the West and more
love of ethnic goods |
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A CLAY FRIDGE is not an aspirational product for a villager, who sees more attractive ones on TV. What India needs is not more jugaad but less wideeyed aping of the West and an appreciation for ethnic products. And what the West needs most is a change in lifestyle to one that guzzles less energy and is healthier, less market-manipulated. The authors probably know this, but don’t want to admit the role of Big Capital in relegating small innovators to the fringes.
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