| Recorded at | November 02, 2009 |
|---|---|
| Event | TEDIndia 2009 |
| Duration (min:sec) | 19:19 |
| Video Type | TED Stage Talk |
| Words per minute | 201.28 very fast |
| Readability (FK) | 63.57 very easy |
| Speaker | R.A. Mashelkar |
Official TED page for this talk
Synopsis
Engineer RA Mashelkar shares three stories of ultra-low-cost design from India that use bottom-up rethinking, and some clever engineering, to bring expensive products (cars, prosthetics) into the realm of the possible for everyone.
| 1 | 00:15 | The big residual | ||
| 2 | 00:17 | is always value for money. | ||
| 3 | 00:19 | All the time we are trying to get value for money. | ||
| 4 | 00:22 | What we don't look for | ||
| 5 | 00:24 | is value for many, | ||
| 6 | 00:26 | while we are generating value for money. | ||
| 7 | 00:29 | Do we care about those four billion people | ||
| 8 | 00:31 | whose income levels are less than two dollars a day, | ||
| 9 | 00:33 | the so-called bottom of the pyramid? | ||
| 10 | 00:36 | What are the challenges in getting value for money | ||
| 11 | 00:39 | as well as value for many? | ||
| 12 | 00:41 | We have described here | ||
| 13 | 00:43 | in terms of the performance | ||
| 14 | 00:45 | and the price. | ||
| 15 | 00:47 | If you have money, of course, you can get the value. | ||
| 16 | 00:50 | You can get a Mercedes | ||
| 17 | 00:52 | for a very high price, | ||
| 18 | 00:54 | very high performance. | ||
| 19 | 00:56 | But if you don't have money, what happens? | ||
| 20 | 00:59 | Well, you are to ride a bicycle, | ||
| 21 | 01:01 | carrying your own weight and also some other weight, | ||
| 22 | 01:04 | so that you can earn the bread for the day. | ||
| 23 | 01:07 | Well, poor do not remain poor; | ||
| 24 | 01:09 | they become lower-middle-class. | ||
| 25 | 01:11 | And if they do so, | ||
| 26 | 01:13 | then, of course, the conditions improve, | ||
| 27 | 01:15 | and they start riding on scooters. | ||
| 28 | 01:18 | But the challenge is, again, they don't get much value, | ||
| 29 | 01:21 | because they can't afford anything more than the scooter. | ||
| 30 | 01:25 | The issue is, at that price, | ||
| 31 | 01:27 | can you give them some extra value? | ||
| 32 | 01:30 | A super value, | ||
| 33 | 01:32 | in terms of their ability to ride in a car, | ||
| 34 | 01:34 | to get that dignity, to get that safety, | ||
| 35 | 01:37 | looks practically impossible, isn't it. | ||
| 36 | 01:40 | Now, this is something | ||
| 37 | 01:42 | that we see on Indian streets | ||
| 38 | 01:44 | all the time. | ||
| 39 | 01:46 | But many people see the same thing | ||
| 40 | 01:48 | and think things differently, | ||
| 41 | 01:51 | and one of them is here, Ratan Tata. | ||
| 42 | 01:56 | The great thing about our leaders | ||
| 43 | 01:58 | is that, should they not only have passion in their belly, | ||
| 44 | 02:02 | which practically all of them have, | ||
| 45 | 02:04 | they're also very innovative. | ||
| 46 | 02:06 | An innovator is one who does not know it cannot be done. | ||
| 47 | 02:09 | They believe that things can be done. | ||
| 48 | 02:11 | But great leaders like Ratan | ||
| 49 | 02:13 | have compassion. | ||
| 50 | 02:15 | And what you said, Lakshmi, is absolutely true: | ||
| 51 | 02:17 | it's not just Ratan Tata, | ||
| 52 | 02:19 | it's the house of Tatas over time. | ||
| 53 | 02:21 | Let me confirm what she said. | ||
| 54 | 02:23 | Yes, I went barefoot | ||
| 55 | 02:26 | until I was 12. | ||
| 56 | 02:28 | I struggled to [unclear] day | ||
| 57 | 02:30 | was a huge issue. | ||
| 58 | 02:32 | And when I finished my SSC, the eleventh standard, | ||
| 59 | 02:35 | I stood eleventh among 125,000 students. | ||
| 60 | 02:38 | But I was about to leave the school, | ||
| 61 | 02:40 | because my poor mother couldn't afford schooling. | ||
| 62 | 02:42 | And it was [unclear] Tata Trust, which gave me six rupees per month, | ||
| 63 | 02:45 | almost a dollar per month for six years. | ||
| 64 | 02:48 | That's how I'm standing before you. | ||
| 65 | 02:50 | So that is the House of Tata. | ||
| 66 | 02:52 | (Applause) | ||
| 67 | 02:55 | Innovation, compassion and passion. | ||
| 68 | 02:57 | They combine all that. | ||
| 69 | 02:59 | And it was that compassion which bothered them, | ||
| 70 | 03:02 | because when he saw -- in fact, he told me about eight or nine years ago | ||
| 71 | 03:05 | how he was driving his own car -- | ||
| 72 | 03:08 | he drives his own car by the way -- | ||
| 73 | 03:11 | and he saw in the rain, | ||
| 74 | 03:13 | a family like the one that I showed to you | ||
| 75 | 03:15 | getting drenched with an infant. | ||
| 76 | 03:17 | And then he said, "Well, I must give them a car that they can afford, | ||
| 77 | 03:20 | one lakh car, $2,000 car." | ||
| 78 | 03:23 | Of course, as soon as you say something like this | ||
| 79 | 03:25 | people say it is impossible, | ||
| 80 | 03:27 | and that's what was said by Suzuki. | ||
| 81 | 03:29 | He said, oh, probably he is going to build a three-wheeler | ||
| 82 | 03:32 | with stepney. | ||
| 83 | 03:34 | And you can see the cartoon here. | ||
| 84 | 03:36 | Well they didn't build that. They built a proper car. Nano. | ||
| 85 | 03:40 | And mind you, I'm six feet half an inch, | ||
| 86 | 03:42 | Ratan is taller than me, | ||
| 87 | 03:44 | and we have ample space in the front | ||
| 88 | 03:47 | and ample space in the back in this particular car. | ||
| 89 | 03:50 | And incredible car. | ||
| 90 | 03:52 | And of course, nothing succeeds like success; | ||
| 91 | 03:55 | the cynics then turned around, | ||
| 92 | 03:58 | and one after the other | ||
| 93 | 04:00 | they also started saying, "Yes, we also want to make a car in the Nano Segment. | ||
| 94 | 04:03 | We'll manufacture a car in the Nano Segment." | ||
| 95 | 04:06 | How did this great story unfold, | ||
| 96 | 04:09 | the making of Nano? | ||
| 97 | 04:11 | Let me tell you a bit about it. | ||
| 98 | 04:13 | For example, how we started: | ||
| 99 | 04:16 | Ratan just began with a five-engineer team, | ||
| 100 | 04:19 | young people in their mid-twenties. | ||
| 101 | 04:22 | And he said, | ||
| 102 | 04:24 | "Well, I won't define the vehicle for you, | ||
| 103 | 04:26 | but I will define the cost for you. | ||
| 104 | 04:28 | It is one lakh, 100,000 rupees, | ||
| 105 | 04:30 | and you are to make it within that." | ||
| 106 | 04:32 | And he told them, | ||
| 107 | 04:34 | "Question the unquestionable. | ||
| 108 | 04:36 | Stretch the envelope." | ||
| 109 | 04:38 | And at a point in time, | ||
| 110 | 04:40 | he got so engrossed in the whole challenge, | ||
| 111 | 04:42 | that he himself became a member of the team. | ||
| 112 | 04:44 | Can you believe it? | ||
| 113 | 04:46 | I still am told about this story | ||
| 114 | 04:48 | of that single wiper design in which he participated. | ||
| 115 | 04:51 | Until midnight, he'd be thinking. | ||
| 116 | 04:53 | Early morning he'll be coming back with sort of solutions. | ||
| 117 | 04:56 | But who was the team leader? | ||
| 118 | 04:58 | The team leader was Girish Wagh, | ||
| 119 | 05:00 | a 34 year-old boy in [unclear]. | ||
| 120 | 05:02 | And the Nano team average age | ||
| 121 | 05:04 | was just 27 years. | ||
| 122 | 05:06 | And they did innovation in design and beyond. | ||
| 123 | 05:10 | Broke many norms of the standard conventions for the first time. | ||
| 124 | 05:13 | For example, that a two-cylinder gas engine | ||
| 125 | 05:16 | was used in a car with a single balancer shaft. | ||
| 126 | 05:19 | Adhesives were replacing the rivets. | ||
| 127 | 05:22 | There was a co-creation, a huge co-creation, | ||
| 128 | 05:25 | with vendors and suppliers. | ||
| 129 | 05:27 | All ideas on board were welcome. | ||
| 130 | 05:29 | 100 vendors were co-located adjacent to the plant, | ||
| 131 | 05:32 | and innovative business models for automobile dealerships were developed. | ||
| 132 | 05:35 | Imagine that a fellow | ||
| 133 | 05:37 | who sells cloth, for example, will be selling Nano. | ||
| 134 | 05:40 | I mean, it was incredible innovation. | ||
| 135 | 05:43 | Seeking solutions for non-auto sectors. | ||
| 136 | 05:46 | It was an open innovation, | ||
| 137 | 05:48 | ideas from all over were welcome. | ||
| 138 | 05:50 | The mechanism of helicopters seats and windows was used, by the way, | ||
| 139 | 05:53 | as well as a dashboard | ||
| 140 | 05:55 | that was inspired by two-wheelers. | ||
| 141 | 05:57 | The fuel lines and lamps | ||
| 142 | 05:59 | were as in two-wheelers. | ||
| 143 | 06:02 | And the crux of the matter was, however, | ||
| 144 | 06:04 | getting more from less. | ||
| 145 | 06:07 | All the time, you have been given an envelope. | ||
| 146 | 06:09 | You can't cross that envelope, | ||
| 147 | 06:11 | which is 100,000 rupees, 2,000 dollars. | ||
| 148 | 06:14 | And therefore, each component | ||
| 149 | 06:16 | had to have a dual functionality. | ||
| 150 | 06:19 | And the seat riser, for example, | ||
| 151 | 06:21 | serving as a mounting for the seat | ||
| 152 | 06:23 | as well as a structural part | ||
| 153 | 06:25 | of the functional rigidity. | ||
| 154 | 06:27 | Half the number of parts | ||
| 155 | 06:29 | are contained in Nano | ||
| 156 | 06:31 | in comparison to a typical passenger car. | ||
| 157 | 06:34 | The length is smaller by eight percent by the way. | ||
| 158 | 06:36 | But the current entry-level cars | ||
| 159 | 06:38 | in comparison to that is eight percent less, | ||
| 160 | 06:40 | but 21 percent more inside space. | ||
| 161 | 06:45 | And what happened | ||
| 162 | 06:47 | was that -- more from less -- | ||
| 163 | 06:49 | you can see how much more for how much less. | ||
| 164 | 06:52 | When the Model T was launched -- | ||
| 165 | 06:54 | and this is, by the way, all the figures | ||
| 166 | 06:56 | that are adjusted to 2007 dollar prices -- | ||
| 167 | 06:59 | Model T was 19,700 by Ford. | ||
| 168 | 07:02 | Volkswagon was 11,333. | ||
| 169 | 07:05 | And British Motor was around 11,000. | ||
| 170 | 07:08 | And Nano was, bang, 2,000 dollars. | ||
| 171 | 07:12 | This is why | ||
| 172 | 07:14 | you started | ||
| 173 | 07:16 | actually a new paradigm shift, | ||
| 174 | 07:19 | where the same people | ||
| 175 | 07:22 | who could not dream of sitting in a car, | ||
| 176 | 07:24 | who were carrying their entire family in a scooter, | ||
| 177 | 07:26 | started dreaming of being in a car. | ||
| 178 | 07:29 | And those dreams are getting fulfilled. | ||
| 179 | 07:32 | This is a photograph | ||
| 180 | 07:34 | of a house and a driver and a car | ||
| 181 | 07:36 | near my own home. | ||
| 182 | 07:38 | The driver's name is Naran. | ||
| 183 | 07:40 | He has bought his own Nano. | ||
| 184 | 07:42 | And you can see, there is a physical space | ||
| 185 | 07:44 | that has been created for him, | ||
| 186 | 07:46 | parking that car, along with the owner's car, | ||
| 187 | 07:49 | but more importantly, they've created | ||
| 188 | 07:52 | a space in their mind that | ||
| 189 | 07:54 | "Yes, my chauffeur is going to come in his own car and park it." | ||
| 190 | 07:57 | And that's why I call it a transformational innovation. | ||
| 191 | 08:01 | It is not just technological, | ||
| 192 | 08:04 | it is social innovation that we talk about. | ||
| 193 | 08:07 | And that is where, ladies and gentlemen, | ||
| 194 | 08:10 | this famous theme | ||
| 195 | 08:12 | of getting more from less for more | ||
| 196 | 08:15 | becomes important. | ||
| 197 | 08:17 | I remember talking about this for the first time in Australia, | ||
| 198 | 08:20 | about one and a half years ago, | ||
| 199 | 08:22 | when their academy honored me with a fellowship. | ||
| 200 | 08:25 | And unbelievably, in 40 years, | ||
| 201 | 08:27 | I was the first Indian to be honored. | ||
| 202 | 08:29 | And the title of my talk | ||
| 203 | 08:31 | was therefore "Indian innovation | ||
| 204 | 08:33 | from Gandhi to Gandhian engineering." | ||
| 205 | 08:36 | And I titled this more from less for more and more people | ||
| 206 | 08:39 | as Gandhian engineering. | ||
| 207 | 08:41 | And Gandhian engineering, in my judgment, | ||
| 208 | 08:43 | is the one which is going to take the world forward, | ||
| 209 | 08:46 | is going to make a difference, | ||
| 210 | 08:48 | not just for a few, but for everyone. | ||
| 211 | 08:50 | Let me move from mobility in a car to individual mobility | ||
| 212 | 08:53 | for those unfortunates | ||
| 213 | 08:55 | who have lost their legs. | ||
| 214 | 08:57 | Here is an American citizen and his son | ||
| 215 | 09:00 | having an artificial foot. | ||
| 216 | 09:02 | What is its price? 20,000 dollars. | ||
| 217 | 09:05 | And of course, these feet are so designed | ||
| 218 | 09:08 | that they can walk only on | ||
| 219 | 09:11 | such perfect pavement or roads. | ||
| 220 | 09:13 | Unfortunately, that's not the case in India. | ||
| 221 | 09:16 | You can see him walk barefoot | ||
| 222 | 09:18 | on an awkward land, sometimes in a marshy land, | ||
| 223 | 09:20 | and so on and so forth. | ||
| 224 | 09:22 | More importantly, | ||
| 225 | 09:24 | they not only walk far to work, | ||
| 226 | 09:26 | and not only do they cycle to work, | ||
| 227 | 09:28 | but they cycle for work, as you can see here. | ||
| 228 | 09:31 | And they climb up for their work. | ||
| 229 | 09:34 | You have to design an artificial foot for such conditions. | ||
| 230 | 09:37 | A challenge, of course. | ||
| 231 | 09:39 | Four billion people, their incomes are less then two dollars a day. | ||
| 232 | 09:42 | And if you talk about a 20,000-dollar shoe, | ||
| 233 | 09:44 | you're talking about 10,000 days of income. | ||
| 234 | 09:47 | You just don't have it. | ||
| 235 | 09:49 | And therefore, you ought to look at alternatives. | ||
| 236 | 09:51 | And that is how Jaipur Foot was created in India. | ||
| 237 | 09:54 | It had a revolutionary prosthetic fitment and delivery system, | ||
| 238 | 09:58 | a quick molding and modular components, | ||
| 239 | 10:01 | enabling custom-made, on-the-spot limb fitments. | ||
| 240 | 10:05 | You could feel it actually in an hour, by the way, | ||
| 241 | 10:07 | whereas the equivalent other feet | ||
| 242 | 10:09 | took something like a day, as so on. | ||
| 243 | 10:11 | Outer socket made by using heated high-density polyethylene pipes, | ||
| 244 | 10:15 | rather than using heated sheets. | ||
| 245 | 10:18 | And unique high-ankle design and human-like looks, | ||
| 246 | 10:21 | [unclear] and functions. | ||
| 247 | 10:23 | And I like to show how it looks | ||
| 248 | 10:25 | and how it works. | ||
| 249 | 10:33 | (Music) | ||
| 250 | 10:37 | See, he jumps. You can see what stress it must have. | ||
| 251 | 10:40 | (Text: ... any person with a below the knee limb could do this. | ||
| 252 | 10:42 | ... above the limb, yes, it would be difficult ... | ||
| 253 | 10:45 | "Did it hurt?" | ||
| 254 | 10:47 | "No ... not at all." | ||
| 255 | 10:58 | ... he can run a kilometer in four minutes and 30 seconds ...) | ||
| 256 | 11:00 | One kilometer in four minutes and 30 seconds. | ||
| 257 | 11:02 | (Applause) | ||
| 258 | 11:15 | So that's what it is all about. | ||
| 259 | 11:17 | And therefore Time took notice | ||
| 260 | 11:19 | of this 28-dollar foot, basically. | ||
| 261 | 11:21 | (Applause) | ||
| 262 | 11:24 | An incredible story. | ||
| 263 | 11:27 | Let's move on to something else. | ||
| 264 | 11:29 | I've been talking about getting more from less for more. | ||
| 265 | 11:31 | Let's move to health. | ||
| 266 | 11:33 | We've talked about mobility and the rest of it, let's talk about health. | ||
| 267 | 11:36 | What's happening in the area of health? | ||
| 268 | 11:38 | You know, you have new diseases that require new drugs. | ||
| 269 | 11:41 | And if you look at the drug development 10 years ago and now, | ||
| 270 | 11:43 | what has happened? | ||
| 271 | 11:45 | 10 years ago, it used to cost about a quarter billion. | ||
| 272 | 11:47 | Today it costs 1.5 billion dollars. | ||
| 273 | 11:51 | Time taken for moving a molecule to marketplace, | ||
| 274 | 11:54 | after all the human and animal testing, | ||
| 275 | 11:57 | was 10 years, now it is 15 years. | ||
| 276 | 12:00 | Are you getting more drugs because you are spending more time and more money? | ||
| 277 | 12:03 | No, I'm sorry. | ||
| 278 | 12:05 | We used to have 40, now they have come down to 30. | ||
| 279 | 12:08 | So actually we are getting less from more | ||
| 280 | 12:10 | for less and less people. | ||
| 281 | 12:12 | Why less and less people? Because it is so expensive, | ||
| 282 | 12:14 | so very few will be able to basically afford that. | ||
| 283 | 12:18 | Let us just take an example. | ||
| 284 | 12:20 | Psoriasis is very dreadful | ||
| 285 | 12:22 | disease of the skin. | ||
| 286 | 12:24 | The cost of treatment, 20,000 dollars. | ||
| 287 | 12:26 | 1,000-dollar antibody injections under the skin, by the way, | ||
| 288 | 12:29 | and 20 of them. | ||
| 289 | 12:31 | Time for development -- it took around 10 years | ||
| 290 | 12:33 | and 700 million dollars. | ||
| 291 | 12:35 | Let's start in the spirit | ||
| 292 | 12:37 | of more from less and more for more | ||
| 293 | 12:39 | and start putting some targets. | ||
| 294 | 12:42 | For example, we don't want 20,000 dollars; we don't have it. | ||
| 295 | 12:45 | Can we do it [for] 100 dollars? | ||
| 296 | 12:47 | Time for development, not 10 years. | ||
| 297 | 12:49 | We are in a hurry. Five years. | ||
| 298 | 12:51 | Cost of development -- 300 million dollars. | ||
| 299 | 12:53 | Sorry. I can't spend more than 10 million dollars. | ||
| 300 | 12:55 | Looks absolutely audacious. | ||
| 301 | 12:57 | Looks absolutely ridiculous. | ||
| 302 | 12:59 | You know something? This has been achieved in India. | ||
| 303 | 13:02 | These targets have been achieved in India. | ||
| 304 | 13:04 | And how they have been achieved ... | ||
| 305 | 13:06 | Sir Francis Bacon once said, | ||
| 306 | 13:08 | "When you wish to achieve results | ||
| 307 | 13:10 | that have not been achieved before, | ||
| 308 | 13:12 | it is an unwise fancy to think | ||
| 309 | 13:14 | that they can be achieved by using methods | ||
| 310 | 13:16 | that have been used before." | ||
| 311 | 13:18 | And therefore, the standard process, | ||
| 312 | 13:20 | where you develop a molecule, put it into mice, into men, | ||
| 313 | 13:22 | are not yielding those results -- | ||
| 314 | 13:24 | the billions of dollars that have been spent. | ||
| 315 | 13:26 | The Indian cleverness | ||
| 316 | 13:28 | was using its traditional knowledge, | ||
| 317 | 13:31 | however, scientifically validating it | ||
| 318 | 13:33 | and making that journey from men to mice to men, | ||
| 319 | 13:36 | not molecule to mice to men, you know. | ||
| 320 | 13:38 | And that is how this difference has come. | ||
| 321 | 13:40 | And you can see this blending | ||
| 322 | 13:42 | of traditional medicine, modern medicine, modern science. | ||
| 323 | 13:44 | I launched a big program | ||
| 324 | 13:46 | [unclear] CSIR about nine years ago. | ||
| 325 | 13:49 | He is giving us not just for Psoriasis, | ||
| 326 | 13:51 | for cancer and a whole range of things, changing the whole paradigm. | ||
| 327 | 13:54 | And you can see this Indian Psoriasis breakthrough | ||
| 328 | 13:56 | obtained by this reverse form of [unclear] | ||
| 329 | 13:58 | by doing things differently. | ||
| 330 | 14:00 | You can see before treatment and after treatment. | ||
| 331 | 14:03 | This is really getting more from less for more and more people, | ||
| 332 | 14:06 | because these are all affordable treatments now. | ||
| 333 | 14:09 | Let me just remind you | ||
| 334 | 14:12 | of what Mahatma Gandhi had said. | ||
| 335 | 14:14 | He had said, "Earth provides enough | ||
| 336 | 14:17 | to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed." | ||
| 337 | 14:20 | So the message he was giving us | ||
| 338 | 14:22 | was you must get more from less and less and less | ||
| 339 | 14:25 | so that you can share it for more and more people, | ||
| 340 | 14:27 | not only the current generation, | ||
| 341 | 14:29 | but the future generations. | ||
| 342 | 14:31 | And he also said, "I would prize every invention of science | ||
| 343 | 14:34 | made for the benefit for all." | ||
| 344 | 14:36 | So he was giving you the message that you must have it for more and more people, | ||
| 345 | 14:39 | not just a few people. | ||
| 346 | 14:41 | And therefore, ladies and gentlemen, | ||
| 347 | 14:43 | this is the theme, getting more | ||
| 348 | 14:45 | from less for more. | ||
| 349 | 14:47 | And mind you, | ||
| 350 | 14:49 | it is not getting just a little more for just a little less. | ||
| 351 | 14:52 | It's not about low cost. | ||
| 352 | 14:54 | It's about ultra-low cost. | ||
| 353 | 14:56 | You cannot say it's a mere treatment 10,000 dollars, | ||
| 354 | 14:58 | but because you are poor I'll give it for 9,000. | ||
| 355 | 15:01 | Sorry, it doesn't work. You have to give it for 100 dollars, 200 dollars. | ||
| 356 | 15:04 | Is it possible? It has been made possible, by the way, | ||
| 357 | 15:07 | for certain other different reasons. | ||
| 358 | 15:10 | So you are not talking about low cost, you are talking about ultra-low cost. | ||
| 359 | 15:13 | You are not talking about affordability, | ||
| 360 | 15:15 | you are talking about extreme affordability. | ||
| 361 | 15:17 | Because of the four billion people whose income is under two dollars a day. | ||
| 362 | 15:21 | You're not talking exclusive innovation. | ||
| 363 | 15:24 | You're talking about inclusive innovation. | ||
| 364 | 15:27 | And therefore, you're not talking about incremental innovation, | ||
| 365 | 15:29 | you're talking about disruptive innovation. | ||
| 366 | 15:31 | The ideas have to be such | ||
| 367 | 15:33 | that you think in completely different terms. | ||
| 368 | 15:36 | And I would also add, | ||
| 369 | 15:38 | it is not only getting more from less for more | ||
| 370 | 15:40 | by more and more people, the whole world working for it. | ||
| 371 | 15:43 | I was very touched when I saw a breakthrough the other day. | ||
| 372 | 15:46 | You know, incubators for infants, for example. | ||
| 373 | 15:48 | They're not available in Africa. | ||
| 374 | 15:50 | They're not available in Indian villages. | ||
| 375 | 15:52 | And infants die. | ||
| 376 | 15:54 | And incubator costs 2,000 dollars. | ||
| 377 | 15:57 | And there's a 25-dollar incubator | ||
| 378 | 15:59 | giving that performance that had been created. | ||
| 379 | 16:01 | And by whom? | ||
| 380 | 16:03 | By young students from Standford University | ||
| 381 | 16:06 | on an extreme affordability project that they had, basically. | ||
| 382 | 16:09 | Their heart is in the right place, like Ratan Tata. | ||
| 383 | 16:12 | It's not just innovation, compassion and passion -- | ||
| 384 | 16:15 | compassion in the heart and passion in the belly. | ||
| 385 | 16:17 | That's the new world that we want to create. | ||
| 386 | 16:20 | And that is why the message is that of Gandhian engineering. | ||
| 387 | 16:22 | Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to end before time. | ||
| 388 | 16:25 | I was also afraid of those 18 minutes. | ||
| 389 | 16:27 | I've still one and a half to go. | ||
| 390 | 16:29 | The message, the final message, is this: | ||
| 391 | 16:32 | India gave a great gift to the world. | ||
| 392 | 16:35 | What was that? | ||
| 393 | 16:37 | [In the] 20th century, we gave Gandhi to the world. | ||
| 394 | 16:40 | The 21st century gift, | ||
| 395 | 16:42 | which is very, very important for the whole world, | ||
| 396 | 16:44 | whether it is global economic meltdown, | ||
| 397 | 16:46 | whether it is climate change -- | ||
| 398 | 16:48 | any problem that you talk about | ||
| 399 | 16:50 | is gaining more from less for more and more -- | ||
| 400 | 16:52 | not only the current generations, | ||
| 401 | 16:54 | for the future generations. | ||
| 402 | 16:56 | And that can come only from Gandhian engineering. | ||
| 403 | 16:58 | So ladies and gentlemen, I'm very happy to announce, | ||
| 404 | 17:01 | this gift of the 21st century | ||
| 405 | 17:03 | to the world from India, | ||
| 406 | 17:05 | Gandhian engineering. | ||
| 407 | 17:07 | (Applause) | ||
| 408 | 17:15 | Lakshmi Pratury: Thank you, Dr. Mashelkar. (R.A. Mashelkar: Thank you very much.) | ||
| 409 | 17:18 | LP: A quick question for you. | ||
| 410 | 17:20 | Now, when you were a young boy in this school, | ||
| 411 | 17:23 | what were your thoughts, like what did you think you could become? | ||
| 412 | 17:26 | What do you think that drove you? | ||
| 413 | 17:28 | Was there a vision you had? What is it that drove you? | ||
| 414 | 17:31 | RAM: I'll tell you a story that drove me, that transformed my life. | ||
| 415 | 17:34 | I remember, I went to a poor school, | ||
| 416 | 17:37 | because my mother could not gather the 21 rupees, | ||
| 417 | 17:40 | that half a dollar that was required | ||
| 418 | 17:42 | within the stipulated time. | ||
| 419 | 17:44 | It was [unclear] high school. | ||
| 420 | 17:47 | But it was a poor school with rich teachers, honestly. | ||
| 421 | 17:50 | And one of them was [unclear] who taught us physics. | ||
| 422 | 17:53 | One day he took us out into the sun | ||
| 423 | 17:55 | and tried to show us how to find | ||
| 424 | 17:57 | the focal length of a convex lens. | ||
| 425 | 18:00 | The lens was here. The piece of paper was there. He moved it up and down. | ||
| 426 | 18:03 | And there was a bright spot up there. | ||
| 427 | 18:06 | And then he said, "This is the focal length." | ||
| 428 | 18:08 | But then he held it for a little while, Lakshmi. | ||
| 429 | 18:11 | And then the paper burned. | ||
| 430 | 18:13 | When the paper burned, for some reason he turned to me, | ||
| 431 | 18:15 | and he said, "Mashelkar, like this, | ||
| 432 | 18:18 | if you do not diffuse your energies, | ||
| 433 | 18:20 | if you focus your energies, | ||
| 434 | 18:22 | you can achieve anything in the world." | ||
| 435 | 18:25 | That gave me a great message: focus and you can achieve. | ||
| 436 | 18:28 | I said, "Whoa, science is so wonderful, | ||
| 437 | 18:30 | I have to become a scientist." | ||
| 438 | 18:32 | But more importantly, focus and you can achieve. | ||
| 439 | 18:35 | And that message, very frankly, | ||
| 440 | 18:37 | is valuable for society today. | ||
| 441 | 18:39 | What does that focal length do? | ||
| 442 | 18:42 | It has parallel lines, which are sun rays. | ||
| 443 | 18:45 | And the property of parallel lines | ||
| 444 | 18:47 | is that they never meet. | ||
| 445 | 18:49 | What does that convex lens do? | ||
| 446 | 18:51 | It makes them meet. | ||
| 447 | 18:53 | This is convex lens leadership. | ||
| 448 | 18:55 | You know what today's leadership is doing? Concave length. | ||
| 449 | 18:58 | They divide them farther. | ||
| 450 | 19:01 | So I learned the lesson | ||
| 451 | 19:03 | of convex lens leadership from that. | ||
| 452 | 19:05 | And when I was at National Chemical Laboratory [unclear]. | ||
| 453 | 19:08 | When I was at Council of Scientific Industry Research -- | ||
| 454 | 19:10 | 40 laboratories -- when two laboratories were not talking to each other, | ||
| 455 | 19:12 | I would [unclear]. | ||
| 456 | 19:15 | And currently I'm president of Global Research Alliance, | ||
| 457 | 19:17 | 60,000 scientists in nine counties, right from India to the U.S. | ||
| 458 | 19:20 | I'm trying to build a global team, | ||
| 459 | 19:23 | which will look at the global grand challenges that the world is facing. | ||
| 460 | 19:26 | That was the lesson. That was the inspirational moment. | ||
| 461 | 19:28 | LP: Thank you very much. (RAM: Thank you.) | ||
| 462 | 19:31 | (Applause) |