Jugaad

Recently read a book on Jugaad and found it quite interesting. It has featured very many native innovations from developing countries. Many of them have an Indian context and I felt quite proud. It was actually a racy read and I was eager to see more and more examples of how countries with are resource starved make do with less.  The authors compares this situation with typical MNCs which have a dedicated research wing with a huge resource budget and having processes with six sigma level of systematisation and documentation. These companies and their research wings have by their very nature prefer expensive products which can be patented. Not for them cheap and easily replicable products.

The authors predict that the world is moving towards resource crunch; or raw material, capital, skilled man power. The power is also shifting from capital intensive countries to consumer driven countries like India and China. The new markets for the mncs are also these countries. They have to necessarily compete with local jugaad products and services. MNCs develop products with more and more features and complications, which are not having many takers in developing countries, where a base model which satisfies the needs of 90% of the population is good enough.These countries do not also have skilled manpower to handle the sophisticated systems nor have the resources to maintain them.

So I felt very good to read in the magazine Sruti, about these jugaad techniques being put to very good use . The feature story was about repair of violins. I have never given a thought to the science of violin repair and more so about the manpower and talent available for that in India. It appears that this is not a developed field and the violinists make do with very rudimentary repair work from hardcore carpenters. The instruments do suffer but that's it. The Lalgudi jayaraman's son Krishnan has for the last few years set up a workshop to train some youngsters in the craft of violin repair. Yes, it does appear to have got a status to being a craft. The teacher from Germany is initially aghast at the rudimentary style of repair work. But then he is also duly impressed with the resourcefulness of the students to collecting the required materials when needed. More so when they needed to be imported and they were expensive and would mean a time delay.

The teacher talks of horse hair for the strings. It has to be white. It has to be horse hair taken from horses who are in the wild and have done lots of outdoor time! Not for him the tame domesticated city bred horses. So it has to be from interior China, Mangolia and Argentina.

Here we are making do with nylon strings.

But then the question remains in my mind. Nowhere in the feature was it mentioned whether sourcing these exotic horse hair has added to the tonal quality of the violin.

I would very much like to know.