This low-cost water purifier can filter up to 500 litres per day without electricity
Built at the cost of Rs 7,000, Jitendra Choudhary's water filter, Shuddham, has the capacity to repurpose 500 litres of dirty water per day for all kinds of household usage except drinking and cooking.
There seems to be no end to the water crisis. The drying lakes, dropping ground water levels, and deficient rains may lead to water wars soon, environmentalists warn. Day Zero was first observed in Cape Town when most of the city’s taps were switched off, to spotlight water consumption.
In India, too, many state governments, organisations, and individuals are coming up with innovative solutions to address the water scarcity issue.
Joining them is 25-year-old Jitendra Choudhary, a native of Rajasthan, who has invented a water filter, which can repurpose used water without the aid of electricity. Called Shuddham, it can filter up to 500 litres of water every day; the filter is priced at Rs 7,000.
Jitendra Choudhary (Image: Efforts For Good)
To give an estimate of our daily water usage, drinking and cooking comprise only 20 percent of the total usage; the rest of the water - a whopping 80 percent - is used for cleaning, bathing, flushing, and other chores.
Talking about the filter with Efforts For Good, Jitendra said,
“Shuddham is a first-of-its-kind water filter, which can filter up to 500 litres of dirty water per day and make it suitable for all household purposes other than drinking or cooking. The machine costs as low as Rs 7,000 with maintenance demanding only Rs 540 per year.”
The filter works on the principle of gravity, and repurposes water used in washrooms through a series of filtration procedures. Recycled water is released through its lowermost segment.
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Shuddham Water Filter (Image: Efforts For Good)
Speaking to Ketto on the water filtration method, he said,
“The water is cleaned within a span of a few minutes through granular sieving, which is later followed by active carbon ultrafiltration. The machine is also equipped with an anti-choke mechanism. This ensures there are no blockages in the flow of the water, and dirty granules do not mix with the clean, purified water.”
Jitendra, who completed his mechanical engineering in 2017, worked as a research scholar at Mahakal Institute of Technology (MIT). He then worked as a research assistant at the MIT Group of Institutions in Ujjain. His filter is now installed at MIT college hostel where it is recycling around 500 litres of water every day. The granules are changed every six months, after the filter recycles 90,000 litres of water.
Jitendra has been bestowed with the Youngest Scientist Award by Madhya Pradesh Council of Science and Technology. So far, he has also published four papers at national and international conferences. Now, Jitendra is working on the design and technical aspects of the filter to take down the cost, and make it more affordable for drought-hit villages in India.
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