This word has various interpretations in various minds .But for me , I liked and am in total consent with what I read on the t shirt of a guy…..The tshirt had JUGAAD printed in bold and just blow it was written a line “The Indian word for creativity”. India is known for its innovations at the cheapest of costs involved. The people who come to visit India are often amazed at the fact that even after having such a large population and chaos, India works efficiently.
The Indians cannot survive without jugaad. How to catch a train on time when you are impossibly late by asking the auto wala to do some jugaad, How to get your file through a series of “friendly”(pun intended) government officials, How to make seating arrangements by using storage trunks, how to make a scooter run for the longest distance with the petrol on reserve by tilting the scooter every now and then on the way…these are things an Indian knows by the virtue of being an Indian.
For majority of Indians, jugaad is creativity,innovation but for some others it is making the seemingly impossible work at the minimal resources present. Quoting my friend here “Jugaad is getting the easiest and most effective solution at the scarcest of resources”. A country like India where people are faced with different situations each day , you can witness the most innovative solutions . I witnessed such a solution the other day on the trip to Lavassa, the first integrated township and hill city .On our way we crossed the area where people face four months of heavy rains each year. Most of the people residing there are villagers who neither find the idea of raincoats effective nor have the comfort of carrying an umbrella to the fields.So the people have designed their own versions of suitable rain shields. They cut the sack (boris) in such a way that it can be easily placed on their heads and over the sacks they have a heavy plastic cut in the same manner as to suit their needs,or at times a plastic sack was proving effective. While wearing these they can roam around freely on the fields and the investment is also negligible. This is “JUGAAD” of India.
The major point for the Jugaadis is that they never say “NO”. They just get the work done. Their decision is not irrational but is rather affected by various factors.
Jugaad sells in India. The biggest example infront of us are the Dabbawallas who manage to make the tiffins reach the customers just before lunch and make it reach their individual homes before the person leaves office for home by the simple color coding which not only determines the tiffin routing but also tiffin prioritizing as tiffins differ from train to bicycle to foot. No science ,no major technology just a plain simple Jugaad of playing with colors has made them achieve virtual six-sigma quality.
North India has moved a step forward in selling the word and its feel to the people. They have introduced a motor vehicle by the name “jugaad” costing around 20,000 bucks. The funda of the vehicle is simple- wooden planks, tyres, water pumps converted to engines and diesel and your are ready to roll……agreed that it has its negative points but it sells and there is no refutation regarding that.
TATA Motors also excelled at selling the dream of the common man by achieving something that even the best of automobile companies could not achieve. They thought and dreamt of selling a car at less than $3,000. When the world was busy with product enhancement they found the solution for the dreams of the millions of India who have been dreaming for years of replacing their bikes with automobiles. They did the “jugaad”.
In essence jugaad much of India runs on Jugaad .In an examination if you do not have a scale you make do with the pencil box for drawing the lines ,if you have a skin problem you prefer using the local herb than going to the dermatologist ….Love it ,Hate it, Ignore it but knowingly or unknowingly we all at some time or other do the “ JUGAAD “
References
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