You can do wonders even without financial backup – The story of Santosh Kaveri

Who says that you cannot do wonders without financial help? Almost everyone says so, you may fret. As a counter argument, here is the case of Santosh Kaveri, a second year student of Samiti's College of Business Administration, Belgaum, Karnataka, who proves that you can do wonders even without financial backup.

Obstacles are opportunities in life – that’s how Santosh views his hurdles. During his school days, he used to walk 10 kms due to lack of transportation. His life has been full of hardship, managing his family, and at the same time studying. Having faced so many problems, he remained determined to ease the life of people. He always wanted to become an entrepreneur, and eventually, Santosh utilised Deshpande Foundation’s Leaders Accelerating Development (LEAD) program as a platform to execute his ideas.

Santosh grew up in an agricultural, rural background, and he had experienced the struggles that he and his family faced as farmers. He identified a specific problem - carrot cleaning. Why is that important? Because, before farmers can sell their carrot produce at the local markets, it must be cleaned to make it appealing to customers. Carrot cleaning, however, is a lengthy and demanding process, one learns. Cleaning one quintal (100 kg) of carrots requires usually the labour of 12 people.

Searching for a solution to this problem, Santosh hit upon an idea one day, after observing a washing machine. He realised that he could apply the same concept to devise a machine that could quickly, and efficiently, clean carrots. He finally devised the Carrot Cleaning Machine, after developing 11 unsuccessful machines.

Santosh’s Carrot Cleaning Machine can clean a quintal of carrots in just 15 minutes and requires the labour of only two people. Today, the Carrot Cleaning Machine is helping farmers in 10 villages. For the entrepreneurial and innovative nature of his project, Santosh was presented with an award by Ratan Tata during the Deshpande Foundation’s 2013 Yuva Summit.

Not stopping with his innovation, Santosh has undertaken other entrepreneurial initiatives. One other product he is currently promoting is the Eco Water Coil, a stovetop device that simultaneously boils water for cooking and collects hot water for bathing. “In India,” Santosh says, “gas is expensive, and no one seems to be concerned about that.” Santosh’s Eco-Water Coil can perform two functions simultaneously, thereby helping people conserve gas.

With so much of development going around in the cities, it is common for most of us to overlook the fact that the rural India still needs to be developed. Thankfully, however, the inspiring example of Santosh shows us that innovations and entrepreneurship can happen in remote pockets of India, despite the lack of funds, and many other hurdles.

If you know of any innovative entrepreneurs like Santosh, please do share their story at shreyansh[at]yourstory[dot]in