Ingenuity of Indians (Jugaad)

Indian is known for Ingenuity

Sandesh Kumar
Finding solutions for what's impossible

In rural India, you may spot a rather unusual vehicle. Halfway between a cart and a tractor, it can carry maybe twelve passengers. It doesn't need a licence plate, but it does have a motor - taken from a surplus water pump - and can travel up to forty kilometres (25 miles) an hour. That can be a problem, since the cart doesn't have brakes to speak of. When the driver needs to stop, the passengers jump off and drag wooden brake shoes against the wheels.

Jugaad is the name of this motorized problem-solving device, and it costs just 60,000 rupees (about $1,300). A jugaad is an alternative solution, an improvisation, a jury-rigged answer conceived by a creative culture in which scarcity and survival are constant challenges. While India makes headlines in the financial press as an economic force to be reckoned with, the real dynamism of its culture is in creations like the jugaad. It's their talent for improvisation that keeps a billion Indians moving forward into the future. Necessity is the mother of invention, as the saying goes - an important lesson for the West. Indian farmers ride triumphantly on their homemade vehicle. It represents their personal victory over the hard reality they inhabit, in which nothing is certain. In their lack of possessions - so unimaginable for Western souls - lies the secret to fulfillment and happiness.

A jugaad is an adaptation; Indians are constantly adapting to their situation. If a train car is too full, they find ways to move over to make space for new passengers. Flexibility is a condition for survival and future success, evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin concluded from his study of nature.

In the West, with its long-established rights and all-powerful lawyers, this wisdom has been lost. If something doesn't work quite right, a Westerner throws it away and buys a new one. An Indian goes in search of a jugaad - and often comes back smiling.