Magnetic Fly Wheel: The story of a super wheel

The proud innovator with a demo

of the Magnetic Fly Wheel.

After all the interviews I had planned were done, an opportunity came to visit one more innovator. I of course embraced this opportunity and we went together with my friend Abrar to Mehsana where we met with Babi Liyakt. Generating energy from movement, he has developed many innovations related to improving the efficiency of wheels of all kind of vehicles. Introducing his innovation, he said that for a vehicle to move it needs fuel, a break and efficiency. With his wheel, a vehicle requires less fuel but is more efficient.

His innovation is basically a metallic wheel attached to the wheel. Through the rotating magnetic field of the attached wheel, the wheel of the vehicle rotates even without an engine. It is very impressive to see. The innovator told stories about how physicists from top universities were amazed by his innovation.

Nevertheless, the innovator has not received support and is  struggling to scale his innovation.  For the other entrepreneurs support has meant access to independent testing facilities, access to a wider network through and financial support. Unlike the other entrepreneurs I have met, Liyakt has not received an award, which gives credibility and self-confidence. The entrepreneurs have also found someone to turn to when they face challenges in operating the business and someone who could listen to their worries related to the business. Liyakt is lacking all of this.

The black part right next to the 

wheel is the Magnetic Fly Wheel.

But Liyakt is not giving up. The biggest supporters of Liyakt are his family. During the interview, we met his son and nephews, who are either studying or have already completed education and are now working. They are able to help through their studies in Physics or help with English and thus international sales.

Liyakt is also conducting tests using his own means. He has paid rickshaw drivers and hired a truck to test the fuel efficiency with and without his additional wheel. He is using the product on his own scooter. Therefore, he is always able to demonstrate to guests and interested listeners. So far, the sales channel is Facebook and they have sold a few hundred wheels across India. Soon they hope to start also international sales as they are getting orders from abroad as well.

Reflections on field research in India

During the five weeks I have been collecting data in India, I have experienced the joys and frustrations of doing field research. The best thing of each field visit is to meet the entrepreneurs whose stories I have read and studied well beforehand. It felt like going on a first date with someone you’d stalked online – I knew almost everything about the story but lacked the personal interaction that would make the picture complete.

Business cards from the field.

It is also very heart-warming how the people we came to interview welcomed us. For the entrepreneurs it was a big honour that a foreign researcher comes to their factory and shows interest in their work. We also interviewed the users of the innovations and representatives of organizations who have supported the entrepreneurs. The users were informed on a short notice about our arrival or not informed at all, and nevertheless were willing to share their stories and thoughts with us. The representatives from the support organizations were extremely helpful and shared their insights on grassroots entrepreneurship.

The most frustrating part of a field visit is that I cannot directly interact with the people we interviewed – simply because I do not speak their language. The languages spoken in Gujarat (the state where we collected the data) are both Hindi and Gujarati. We went to the field with a translator – from Gujarati to Hindi – to give the entrepreneurs the opportunity to talk also in their mother tongue. Nevertheless, I was actively listening and learned to listen even when I didn’t understand the language.

Field visits mean many hours spent in traffic.

Planning was also a source of frustration at times. I am a very organized person but in this environment, the things are done differently. Plans are made at most one week in advance, meetings can be cancelled last minute and rescheduled on a very short notice. I felt I had to be constantly on standby and flexible with making any own plans, in case the interviewees are available after all.

Many of the entrepreneurs wanted to know if their product could be used in my country. Most of the innovations we covered were agriculture related and the entrepreneurs might not understand that I live very far away in a place with four seasons and where it is mostly cold compared to India and therefore the need for agricultural products is different. Nevertheless, for the future, I know I should do also some background research to have an answer ready on the how the products would be perceived in my country. And I hope in the future I can do many many more field visits – despite the frustrations, it has been a great experience.

Akshar Agro Engineering: the story of the groundnut digger

To meet entrepreneur number 4 we had to make again a five-hour drive to Rajkot. In a village 17 km away from Rajkot, we met with Sanjay Tilwa who has developed the Groundnut Digger. It is a machine that eases the harvesting of groundnuts.

Sanjay Tilwa in his factory, with

in the background the frames utilized in manufacturing.

In the beginning, the groundnut digger did not reach commercial success and therefore Sanjay decided to develop a plowing machine. He purchased a plowing machine from a large manufacturer and reverse engineered a cheaper version. Now this machine is selling well in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh – despite the competition from established organizations. With these sales, he can fund the company.

When we discussed the future, Sanjay told he had bold plans to grow and believed that the groundnut digger will be the machine that will help him achieve the goals. Sanjay explained that there is no standard measurement but that he has to make customizations for each region’s groundnut farmers. Currently he is making tailored solutions according to a farmer’s wishes but in order to grow, he said, he has to develop one model that fits all.

Related to the future, we also discussed financial matters. Sanjay had been approached by his bank two years back because his financial records had been stable for a while and the bank wanted to offer him a loan. I wanted to know why he had not gone to the bank earlier and his answer was short – he was not aware of the financial services a bank could have offered. It was a surprising answer and a good reminder of how the world looks to a grassroots entrepreneur. Formal institutions such as banks and patent registers do not feel relevant to them.

Groundnut diggers ready to be shipped to clients

where the will be assembled.

The most exciting moment of the field visit is always when the entrepreneur shows his factory. The factory of Sanjay was relatively small and he hopes to buy the factory neighboring his factory to facilitate future growth. Sanjay had though how to make the production faster and made frames, which he had attached to the workshop floor. Utilizing these, the workers know the size of the machine and the manufacturing process is much faster. Sanjay also told that the raw materials come from the nearby ship breaking industry. He sends his drawings and the measurements and they deliver the parts. The availability of raw materials providers played a role also when selecting the location for his factory.

Chetak Industries: a story from the cotton industry

The textile industry faces many challenges – from long supply chains and lack of transparency to microfibers polluting our seas. On our third field visit we met an entrepreneur whose innovation helps to battle one challenge – child labour in the cotton industry. Mansukhbhai Patel has developed a Cotton Stripper machine that automated the process of removing cotton out of its shell. It is specifically developed for the type of cotton that grows in Gujarat, his state in India.

Mansukhbhai Patel explaining how the Cotton Stripper works.

Even though he struggled a lot as a starting grassroots entrepreneur, today Mansukhbhai has a company called Chetak Industries manufacturing Cotton Stripper machines. It is marked on Google maps and located in an area where many other industrial factories are also located. The factory seemed very professional and Mansukhbhai shared his frustration that people do not see his initial struggle – he lived a financially unstable life, his children had to drop out of school to help him, he had to move out of the big city to cut costs.

At the end of the interview, I asked for a tour in his factory. He showed us where the machine is made and we saw a few men working on assembling one Cotton Stripper. Next he showed us a Cotton Stripper and showed us where the raw cotton with shells go in, explained that inside three large tubes rotate removing the shells and finally the shells and the cotton come out from two different tubes. Unfortunately this is not the cotton harvesting season so we could not see the machine fully operating.

We also visited one factory owner that had purchased the Chetak machine six-seven years ago. From him we learned that due to the machine, he works directly with farmers instead of traders and the process is much faster. In the past the farmer would deliver the cotton from the field to households where the cotton was removed manually from the shell. Then the factory owner had to go from house to house to collect the cotton. The Cotton Stripper machine has automated this process and today it is much faster than in the past.

The cotton stripper of the factory owner we met.

Of course I was also concerned about the workers whose work was replaced by the machine. The factory owner told us that he used to employ 35-40 people and with then machine that was reduced to 10-15 people. He told that the workers were not happy in the beginning, but that they had now found other jobs, which are less laborious and tedious. Mansukhbhai also explained that due to the government employment programs, people would nowadays not be willing to work as cotton strippers with a low salary. That is of course good news for him and business is going well.

Shooting stars and sunsets in the desert

People often travel to see and experience something new, and for that we usually go to places we've never been before. However, before coming to India I thought to myself that, if time allows, I would like to do again a camel safari and sleep under the stars in the desert. I mentioned to one friend and quickly we were a group of 12 people travelling to Jaisalmer and Jodhpur.

We left Thursday evening with the night bus to Jaisalmer. It was just as uncomfortable as I remembered, but everyone managed to sleep at least a few hours. At our hostel - Abu Safari Jaisalmer - we first enjoyed breakfast and the view on the fort. After regaining our energy we walked up to the fort. It is basically the old city of Jaisalmer and people are living inside the fort. The streets are very narrow and it is easy to get lost. Before lunch we were strolling around, taking pictures, getting lost and buying souvenirs from the many shops in side the fort.

Lunch was a thali on a rooftop terrace, where we escaped the hottest time of the day. After lunch we went to the City Palace, which looked nicer from the outside than the inside. From the top of the palace we saw the view over Jaisalmer, but it actually not a very nice city. It is worth visiting only because the camel safaris start there and tourism is a mayor source of income for the people of Jaisalmer. We were back at the hostel just on time for the sunset, had an early dinner a few glasses of beer, talked about the meaning of life and went to bed early as the next day we were starting our camel safari.

We left one hour later as planned, but finally made it to our camels. Riding the camel was in the beginning very special but after some time it got very exhausting for the legs. We were riding for about two hours until we stopped for lunch. We sat on blankets under one tree while our camel guys prepared lunch under another tree. Our lunch, and later also our dinner, was chapati with mixed vegetables. The men made even the chapatis also in the desert - in India everything is possible! And the food tasted as if it was prepared in a real kitchen and not under a tree.

Our lunch and dinner in the desert.

After lunch we continued for one hour until we reached the spot where we would sleep. In the morning the temperature was cooler but after lunch it was very hot. The camel men were walking so for them it was very exhausting of course and they seemed happy when we reached our final destination of the day. We stopped for the night at a spot where we had on one side in the distance windmills, on one side vegetation and on one side sand dunes. Many expected a desert to be only sand but in this desert people were growing water melons!

The sun is rising while everyone is

still sleeping under the warm blankets

After resting for some time we went for a walk on the sand dunes and saw yet another beautiful sunset. We ate dinner in the darkness and played a game together. We all slept on a large sheet of plastic and the camel men gave us blankets to lie on. It was not the most comfortable sleeping arrangement, but the night sky was absolutely beautiful so I didn't mind waking up every few hours. We went to sleep at different times but it was difficult to sleep when you could hear everything - movement, talking, windmills, camels. At 2 AM, I was very awake and luckily wasn't the only one. We watched the moon setting behind the horizon, took a short walk on the sand dunes and tried to go back to sleep. I stayed lying at the stars until I had seen shooting stars and for each shooting star I made a wish. After all, the night sky and the stars were the reason I wanted to do the camel safari again!

In the morning I woke up before everyone else (it was very cold since 5 AM) and saw the sunrise. Breakfast was porridge, which was again prepared in the desert and tasted amazing. We were also served oranges and bread. After breakfast we continued with the camel ride for one hour. Then we stepped in a jeep and drove back to our hostel - the camel safari was over.

Jodhpur from the Mehrangarh fort.

The second stop of our trip was Jodhpur, where we spent one full day. We walked up to the fort, which is called Mehrangarh in Jodphur. As proper tourists we did the audio tour and learned about the life inside the fort centuries ago. After the fort we walked back in to the city, had lunch and did some shopping. We also found a spice shop where we got a short introduction into Indian spices. We also learned that tikka means small pieces of chicken, masala is a mixture of spices and the best fish is in the south. The lady also showed us the difference between real saffron and fake saffron, which is actually paper mass coloured red. I bought Indian chai ingredients so I can now make chai at home - it probably won't taste like the chai in India, though.


After pizza for dinner, we went to the bus stop where our bus back to Ahmedabad left. Even though not every moment was equally much fun and despite the fact that I had been in the places before, the trip exceeded all my expectations. It confirmed again that people around you make moments special and experiences unique.