टवीटर ते वर्छो
Born and brought up in the city of dreams, Vijayawada, I had close affinity for the city where I grew. After pursuing my studies in CIPET (Central Institute of Plastics Engineering and Technology) in Chennai, I moved for Delhi to pursue my career. Though I secured a job, I was not happy. I wanted to do something of my own for which I should be proud. The thought of innovation and entrepreneurship was always there with in me. So, I embarked my journey by venturing into plastic industry in the year 2000 and over a period of time, we were successful in making moulds operating out of Noida. Being a successful entrepreneur, I was not satisfied with my journey. My appetite of doing more to the society has sown in me since long time. I wanted to use my expertise and experience for a cause, which could benefit the society.
One day, during my transit, I was waiting for my train at a railway station and was checking for the toilets. After a long walk, I could find one toilet which was functional but in extreme unhygienic condition and untidy maintenance due to water scarcity which would invariably lead to infections and ill health. The urinal odour emanating from that public toilet was unbearable and was making it difficult to breathe. I was totally appalled by the sight. No doubt, I felt, the citizens are forced to urinate in public places due to these pathetic conditions. Having no choice, few people continue to relieve themselves despite lack of water in the public toilets. It is then, I thought of doing something for the society on this prevailing and pertinent issue. My contributions could help citizens and keep them at bay in relieving themselves in open vulnerable points at public places especially roads.
Swachh Bharat mission is one of the most effective program that has always inspired me and my team to contribute something to the cleaner and healthier society. One of the aim of Swachh Bharat is elimination of public urination. To achieve this, the urinals should be easily accessible to the general public, it should be clean, well maintained and odour free. When this is achieved, there will be a behavioural welcoming change in public of not urinating in open places too.
Based on this premise, we started conceptualising “naturesani ®” in the year 2014 and company registration and startup DIPP has been done in the 2017. Over years, we were successful from ideation to execution of naturesani. Our first commode was installed in the year November 2017 at Secunderabad Railway Hyderabad Bhavan.
Our motive was to develop our own product, brand and should mainly complement make in India concept without relying on importing spare parts, product and equipments from our neighbouring countries. Though, there was a financial crunch in terms of initial funding to take this idea to the next level, I approached many fund raisers and got discouragement from many people that my concept will not be successful and all the efforts would go down the drain. My team and I paid no heed to those discouraging comments and was resolute not to look back and move forward to achieve my goal on building our own product. If we are successful, then we will produce more, if we are not, then we learn from our past mistakes, relearn and improvise on where we faltered in the past execution. But, we won’t let our ideation die. This ideology has driven us to march forward that has eventually given birth to “naturesani”, a waterless urinal cartridge and commodes in the year 2014. Our hard work, perseverance, learning from failure, love for what we are doing have finally paid off fructified results. What else do we ask for when the Indian Govt. through its Swachh Bharat mission has appreciated us and conferred with national Swaatchathon -2017 award. We were semi-finalists in Swach-a-thon 1.0.2017 and featured in the “Swaatchathon” Booklet released by the Prime Minister of India on 2nd Oct 2017. Also awarded 2nd Prize in Swachh Bharat Grand Program, 2018 organized by Startupindia in Sanitary domain and at many more Government and Private Organizations. This is indeed a privilege and big achievement for us.
Made In India, Made For Everyone: Our Technology has also been approved as an innovative product and recommended by Dr. Mashellkar Committee from Ministry Drinking Water and Sanitation, Govt. of India for accreditation of Innovative, Scalable, Affordable and Socially acceptable Technology. Also, Our product Patent Pending and Design Registered.
A humble beginning
Any individual or a team should have the curiosity element in them so that innovative ideas would evolve and strive to realization. I was always curious throughout my life and would continue to be inquisitive in the future. During the course job execution at Delhi, I have fixed many critical moulds and production line issues for motor engineering critical parts, resolved toys product issues, electronic products etc., I have always achieved FTR (First Time Right). My hunger to do more has compelled me to quit my job and decided to start my own. With a humble start, we started taking mould orders and gradually we elevated to provide complete solutions to customers right form Design phase to Production phase, thus involving in full production life cycle.
Gillette, which is pioneer in safety razors and personal care products, was facing a critical issue on the technical line stoppage and have thrown open to external vendors to resolve this issue. I got curious and took it as a challenge and finally fixed that critical issue. The Vice-President of Gillette has sent a personal thank you note.
One should never become complacent with their knowledge. One has to be passionately curious which eventually open doors to several innovations. During our course of being inquisitive, we started our own factory that provides complete solutions to the customers. We partnered with big companies as a vendor providing parts and components for life line Medical Components, Electrical and Electronics components for Havells. Printer, Keyboard components for TVS, construction earth-moving lifting equipments for JVM, battery packs for walkie-talkie components, Vehicle components for Honda, Yamaha. Provided moulds for the manufacturing of LED Lights. Throughout our journey, we could always garner customer delight and several accolades, which encouraged us to set ourselves new benchmarks and surge to greater heights.
Journey of “naturesani”
Public urinals are emanating urinal odour due to poor maintenance and lack of water. People continue to relieve themselves despite no water in the public toilets, which would eventually lead to infections. That is when we thought of building urinal commodes, which would be waterless, odourless, compact with minimal maintenance and cost effective.
Keeping these prime concerns in mind, we formed a team and spent time in R&D in designing and building the cartridge and commode. Over a period of time, the product has gone through rigorous quality checks before it was released into market. Initially, our team members suggested that we buy commodes from China and sell it in India. I was constantly inspired by the “Make in India” concept and was against on the notion of importing the product from other countries. Though, struggled during our initial days, however, finally after 4 years of persistent efforts and hard work, we eventually built our indigenous “naturesani”, the waterless urinal commodes.
We are now an ISO 9001:2015 certified company in line with our vision to design and develop world-class, aesthetic, environment-friendly building materials and cartridge with a urinal system. Motivated by this vision, our R&D lab developed technology that can facilitate odorless, waterless & chemical free urinal systems. These are useful for Indoor & Outdoor applications. naturesani ® is now a green subsidiary of bsi®. http://www.naturesani.com/
It has been a proven technological and environmental innovation and is on its mission of saving water for the nation, minimized usage of cleaning chemicals, helping in increased awareness for the current and prospective users. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWhdinijPEY&feature=youtu.be)
We completed installing commodes with Hyderabad Railways, GMR Delhi, United Spirits etc., We also installed “naturesani” at few metro stations in Hyderabad. It can easily be installed and easy to maintain, resulting in healthy, odourless & hygiene environment. Our sincere thanks to Hyderabad Metro Railway Limited MD Mr. N.V.S.Reddy and GM Mr. B.N.Rajeswar Rao for encouraging startups like us and appreciating our innovation. They had approved to install “naturesani” urinal stands at metro stations. We have come up with unique idea 1in1, 2 in 1, 3 in 1, 6 in 1 space accommodation of commodes in 1 stand. The authorities have approved 3 in 1 stand as of now. We are also in the process of identifying the vulnerable points of public urination in the urban and rural areas and collaborate with government and other agencies to facilitate the installation of naturesani at the national level.
The journey has not been very easy from ideation till realization, it took four and half years of constant R&D, investment and efforts in various forms like manpower, identification of shortcomings in existing urinals. We are now happy that we are able to come up with the best product like never before. The acknowledgement from all sections of the industry on its merits is a testimony and a sure reward for us. We look forward to contributing to the nation at a greater scale as it is everyone’s need.
The statistics shows that based on an average estimation of commercial use, it is estimated that our waterless unit can save approximately up to 1.50 Lakh litres of water per year. It is quite challenging to reduce consumption of water for drinking, cooking etc., which are our basic requisites. However, each one of us can surely relook at the other forms of using water and save wherever possible. There is a need for all of us to join hands and collaborate with one another to make it a better society and save our planet.
We are proud to have been part of this wonderful journey of such a huge successful project, which is easily accessible in many places, helps the common people refrain open urination and effectively use our installed products efficiently.
Our journey has just started, and we continue to spread our wings at the national level too. My special thanks to my team, family, well wishes for their relentless support in our journey.
Save water and earth for current and future generations
Jay Swachh Bharat. Jay Hind.
