India Centric Technology & Engineering for Atmanirbhar Bharat
Prologue
India is celebrating 75 years of Independence that have witnessed ups and downs. Despite freedom on the physical plane, the people in general are continuing to suffer from mental and intellectual inadequacies resulting into adherence to thoughts and practices from the Western world either in pristine form or modified versions. Whereas in the initial decades the Western models of socialism or communism had been adopted, but they gave way to capitalism in the later decades. The inability to aim for an India centric economic policy is clear from the fact that “Arthashashtra” of Kautilya, now lauded as the founder of modern economics, is absent from libraries and curricula of all economics and business schools of India, albeit it would need to be modified to suit the present socio-political culture.
The diffidence of the people is also obvious from a reading of the essay on “Science” in Wikipedia where India is conspicuously absent as a contributor in the fields of mathematics, astronomy, health, etc. despite having been the pioneers in the world. The main reason being that the thought and learning processes plus the omnipresent media have been allowed to be West dominated.
In the field of finance, persons and businesses concerned are oblivious to drainage of India’s wealth in offshore tax havens controlled by old colonisers and lack the courage to question the defective financial architecture harming the country
In the backdrop of the above developments, the clarion call for Atmanirbhar Bharat is timely and laudable.
As a thought is needed to be translated into action, associations such as the Innovative Thought Forum (ITF) have arranged round tables on the theme of “Pragmatic Ways for Atmanirbhar Bharat” on many subjects recently and have come up with an anthology containing 75 articles in 12 areas, by India centric thought leaders and experts, to suggest feasible and practical ways for making India stronger.
- a) Foreign Trade
- b) Internal Trade and e Commerce
- c) Finance and Taxation
- d) Health and Wellness
- e) Skilling and Employment
- f) Education and Research
- g) Environment and Climate Change
- h) Energy and Water
- i) Farming, Fertilisers and Foods
- j) Land and Infrastructure
- k) Defence and Space
- l) Technology and Entrepreneurship
Technology and Engineering for Real Solutions
Technology is the application of scientific knowledge, basic and applied, for practical purposes and is thus the sum total of all known techniques, skills, methods and processes used in building and the production of desired structures, goods and providing services.
Engineering, on the other hand, is the use and application of science and technology to design and build machines, structures, etc., both in physical and virtual space.
For sake of simplification, the term engineering in this article will cover both engineering and technology.
India is unique in most ways by having distinctive sets of problems in every domain. The current paradigm of globalisation predicated on “one size fits all” is not going to serve the country well and hence there is a need to put India first and evolve solutions that address its needs optimally through a combination of local solutions and adapted global prescriptions.
Although there are nearly 7000 engineering institutions producing over one million engineers a year, it is found that the country is saddled with nagging problems because the engineers are not applying their mind nor putting in time and efforts to find solutions using their innate and acquired knowledge. Inadequate monetary benefits from such pursuit also drives engineers to other lucrative areas or emigration to other countries.
With resetting of the vision and an India centric perspective, dramatic changes could be brought about in all the spheres. A few of the engineering efforts which would really help India in becoming Atmanirbhar are Agriculture and Food, Renewable and Green Energy, Housing and Infrastructure, Waste to Resource or Environment, Health, and, Education and Skilling
Agriculture and Food
Agriculture has deep connection with water, energy, food, fertiliser, nutrition, health and environment. Agriculture Engineering encompasses science and the principles relating to the various disciplines of food science, environmental, mechanical, civil, electrical, chemical, and software engineering to improve the efficiency of farms and agribusiness enterprises as well as to ensure sustainability of natural and renewable resources. A few India centric areas for agriculture engineering and food that need attention are:
- Massive production of low-cost Tools and Equipment for farming.
- Decentralised Cold Storage facilities using a mix of renewables and fossil.
- Decentralised Dehydration facilities using renewables.
- Decentralised Agri processing facilities.
- Decentralised or Cooperative Organic fertiliser production using efficient biogas plants.
- IT opensource solutions for a variety of Agri activities.
- GIS for agriculture.
- Cultivation of Organic Medicinal Plants and conversion into Nutritional and Medical products.
- Hydroponic, Aquaponic and Aeroponic systems for cultivation at desired places.
- Development of biofertlisers and organic fertilisers for production and widespread use, and
- Engineering for Rainwater collection, storage and efficient use for multi cropping.
Renewable and Green Energy
The Energy sector is undergoing a rapid change with renewable energy now lower in cost than that from fossil fuels. Solar Power is being contracted at less than Rs 3 per unit in India and Rs. 2 in many parts of the world without any subsidy. Wind Power is also becoming cheaper all over the world and would see further decline with technical advancements both in onshore and offshore installations. The inherent drawback of discontinuity of renewable power availability will be thing of the past with progress in cheaper power storage technologies.
India is a major importer of fossil fuel and will gain a lot by focusing on renewables in an appropriate way. The focus of the policy makers so far has been on the supply side and very little work has so far been done on the demand side despite some resolutions by top leaders. In a recent survey conducted by the Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) it has been learnt that the demand of power of rural enterprises is for 10/12 hours and that for agriculture for a few hours. India centric and design centric thinking as enumerated below, throws up many pathways for reducing import dependency and improving the country’s prosperity.
- Solar installations for pumping water – there is a perfect match in the discontinuous demand and supply.
- Solar installations in all manufacturing units to meet their demand partially.
- Decentralised Microgrids using renewables like solar, biogas, biomass, wind, small hydro, etc.
- Small Windmills for low-speed areas.
- Biogas plants with suitable improvements for production of gas, power and fertiliser from animal and kitchen waste.
- Engineering for improving efficiency of use of power in all sectors: manufacturing, transport, agriculture and buildings.
- Engineering for deployment of solar thermal applications in cooking, heating and industrial processing.
- Engineering for hybrid use of solar and fossil fuel thermal energy.
- Engineering for production and use of hydrogen for many uses like in heavy vehicles, buses, etc. and decentralised power grids, and
- Engineering for energy storage – hydro, batteries, phase change materials, hydrogen, etc.
Housing and Infrastructure
Housing is a basic need. Due to a mythical shortage of land and the complex regulatory or licence regime, shortage of proper pucca housing is faced in many parts of the country and that has given rise to mushrooming of slums and unhealthy living quarters.
Infrastructural requirements are really humongous and need judicious use of technology and engineering. Some of the steps that can help the country are:
- Using GIS and related technologies for identification of Wasted Lands, i.e., land parcels within exiting built environments, that have not been in use for last 20 years and will not be put to use for the next 20 years. Wasted Lands are thus different and distinct from Waste Lands. The Wasted Lands should be incorporated into the Master Plan of the built environment.
- Using a suite of technologies to convert Wastelands for agriculture into useful lands for aquaculture, sericulture, poultry, etc. in PublicPrivate Partnership (PPP) or Public-Private People Partnership (PPPP) mode as well as for housing.
- Using IT to manage such leased parcels for Wastelands and Owned parcels of Wasted Lands for designated purposes.
- Technologies for efficient usage of energy in built spaces.
- Technologies for efficient usage and recycling of water in built spaces.
- Mechanised or semi mechanised methods of construction for better quality, and
- IT for online approvals of plans and monitoring of the approved plans.
Waste and Environment
Every activity generates waste and the proponents of Circular Economy demonstrate that every waste could be used as a resource for some other place or thing. There are many engineering methods to give shape to this dictum. A few feasible low hanging fruits to tap are:
- All animal waste like Gobar and food waste is great for biogas and organic fertiliser. Biogas plants to suit different needs can be designed and engineered to convert the waste into useful products.
- Technologies for treating sewage for use as industrial water or agricultural water.
- Low-cost biotech solution for treating human waste at site for maintaining hygiene of toilets all over India
- Technologies for sorting, transportation, managing and processing dry solid wastes.
- Perfection of technologies for use of plastic waste in road construction that can improve the quality of roads and thus also improve the environment. Plastic waste could also be converted/ moulded for use in other building materials.
- Knowhow for use of Fly Ash in agriculture and forests to increase output.
- Low-cost technologies for ZLD (Zero Liquid Discharge), and
- Clean production technologies to reduce air pollution.
Health
Health is recognised as a prerequisite for all pursuits -Dharm, Arth, Kam, and Moksh.
The health sector has evolved and now involves various branches of science and engineering such as agriculture, nutritional sciences, biomedical engineering, phytochemical engineering, public health engineering, chemical engineering, biotech, etc. A few solutions that stem from these are:
- Biotech Engineering for affordable production of specific immunity tools like vaccines, nosodes, etc.
- IT for telemedicine to deliver quality service and counsel all over the country.
- Nanotechnology based solutions for safer and better medicines.
- Engineering for improved medical devices and surgical tools, and
- Engineering for on-site and low-cost disinfection of water to improve public health.
Education and Skilling
Education is the foundation of every successful civilisation. Training or skilling has proved to be a game changer in the competitive world and is the backbone of developed nations who give it equitable place in all their plans.
Education technology, in short called Edutech, has shown it’s immense utility in the current pandemic. The country is endowed with an abundant population that can be a more valuable resource with proper education and training, for all ages, by combination of centralised and decentralised options. Building flexibility in the processes while focussing on the outcomes and reducing controls in the education field, can reap rich dividends.
A few transformational engineering initiatives in this domain worth considering are:
- Building platforms for open-source online education, training and skilling
- Building platforms for involving willing retired teachers and trainers to impart knowledge online and offline
- Building platforms for RPL (Recognition for Prior Learning) by diluting entrance criteria in time with India‘s needs and by having a two-tier certification system
- Type A for people with poor literary or numerary abilities or skills
- Type B for learners with proper literacy and numerary skill sets
- Technology for delivering skills or knowledge to people in their own habitats
- Using ICT to impart education and skills at optimal cost while enhancing each
- Priority to skilling of agricultural and construction workers for all round improvement
- Assessing demand of India and recasting education and skill programmes to meet it
- Incorporating simple modules for basics of business in all courses at secondary and higher levels for sharpening entrepreneurial skills of micro and small enterprises
- Digital literacy for various sections of the society
The examples given above can provide sustainable results if a few cardinal factors are incorporated in all the domains.
- Designing or engineering for proper utilisation of the resources.
- Waste Reduction/ Reuse/ Recycle / Recover/ Recreate (i.e. use the 5R principle)
- Integrated and holistic Costing taking into account Capex and Opex and accounting for the full life of the facility.
- Continuous Upgrading of Knowledge and Skills of all Human Resources for optimum quality and quantity outputs.
- Concomitant changes in Education, Research and Programmes for India centric thinking and action.
Conclusions
The expanse of Engineering is ever increasing and now even Financial Engineering is commonplace. In the Indian context, conversion of engineering solutions into enterprises would hold the key to the success of a mission. The Start-up ecosystem for local and global markets would be an important lever for success. A confident engineering community to efficiently solve the problems of India without sacrificing their abilities to win global markets is the need of the hour.
References
- “Pragmatic ways for Atmanirbhar Bharat”, 2021 by S B Dangayach and Anil Sharma
- Shobhit University, International Webinar Series in Open Source Digital Technologies for Self-Reliant India, Topic “Pragmatic ways for Atmanirbhar Bharat”, 1st January 2022
Link for published Article in Official quarterly magazine of CEAI on Becoming Atmanirbhar Concept to Reality:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11VYJsy0dYdD9y26npI4RBhPNNTd2gOa7/view?usp=sharing