Prof. Ashok Jhunjhunwala in conversation with Prof. Devendra Jalihal Episode 1 Part 3 of 3.
Another aspect that I would like to bring up
is that same period; I don't know, ‘81 or ‘82 onwards.
I had…I was teaching some M. Tech. students,
our M. Tech. students were Nandita Dasgupta,
Amitava Dasgupta, both of them who are
faculty. There was one Rajesh Sanghi
who had come from Air Force.
Somehow I got actually quite friendly with them,
very friendly with bunch of them.
So it was not just undergraduate with M. Tech. students,
actually I found…and this is not about individuals,
but I did find that Master’s students,
and from very early onwards we are noting,
that if you put a Master’s students
and undergraduate students together in the same class,
and I very often used to have.
In performance, the undergraduate students
will perform far superior than Master’s students.
But if you take persistence
in trying to do something,
if I give a difficult problem which will take multiple
days and weeks, you will see our Master’s
student doing very well compared to
our undergraduate students.
This is something that I remember
starting to note from 1983 onwards.
And probably IIT still does not fully understand
that the students who come from other colleges,
but are willing to work very hard,
in long run they are as good, and
probably better than our undergraduate students.
This is something that IIT system did not understand.
I started noticing…to me it came as a surprise,
and of course, I had some very good students and all that.
I was, at the same time, starting to work on
various sub systems, particularly after
that WS Industries, I had delivered that
power-line carrier communication, and the only person
who was building systems in the
department for anyone was Professor J. P. Raina
in what we later on termed as Fiber Optics Lab.
I started taking interest in his work
and saw that what he is
trying to build is relatively simple.
His contacts were huge. He had huge defence contacts,
he has contacts in…DRDO,
he had contacts in Ministry of Electronics,
he was very aggressive person,
so he will go and sell them something.
But I also noticed that it…it
particularly since most of…were communication system
he didn't have very good idea how to build it.
But that’s where I came in;
I learnt how to build it.
So one of the first project
that Professor Raina and I did together
was a very interesting project and
tells you a lot about India.
The people from CVRD had come
some defence officers had come,
senior people from DRDO
and said the new people are working on optical fiber
and Professor Raina was just starting to
work on optical fiber.
And he had said what I would
what they would like to do was build a
fiber optic communication system for a battle tank.
Within the tank have a network. Within the tank,
little surprised.
We went and visited CVRD
and I found that the inside of the tank
in which 5 people used to sit
was no bigger than this circle,
in fact, smaller than this.
And everybody would set with their face outward
with that they will not see each other.
Had they said that the we want a fiber optic system
for them to talk to each other.
I said why they are just next to each other?
They made me go on a ride
and I saw that the tank he was making huge noise.
The noise was so much that we
couldn't talk to each other.
So, there is a only way we could do
it using headphones and cables.
So, that's what they were using.
Where did fiber optics come from?
You are talking about 1, 2 maybe 3 voice conversation,
we used to talk about something which
can multiply 64 voice signals and lot of data signals.
Here they were talking about 3, 4 of this and
maybe a few indicator somebody will turn
their light will go on very little data communication,
very little voice communication.
And I said why is it required
there is an interesting story told to us
I don't know whether story is true,
but is a very interesting story this is a story about
when Pakistan had attacked us with Patton tank.
And the Patton tank coming from US was so powerful,
the Pakistani army was marching with the tank
and our we could not just defend anything that
we will shoot at the tank will just
go for a toss it will not penetrate.
The story actually went that till somebody actually
figured out that they will put a person
who will bend down and kind of hide in bushes.
And when the tank will come he will run down
climb up the tank open the hood throw a bomb
and run for his life and he says that is how
India battled and won against Pakistan
in one of the tank.
But what I was told that things became more complicated
even when our tanks were getting deployed
that were nothing else will penetrate,
the confusion was created by a
electronic gun which will just shoot
a radio waves and somehow it will
penetrate the tank at some frequency.
And will create so much of noise
in those cables that it will be
impossible for people to talk to each other
they will put the headphone down
and they will no longer be able to talk to each other.
And if they are not talking to each other gunner is
pointing in direction different from what they should point,
the driver who is taking in one direction,
commander is asking you to do something
and there will be chaos that's a time they will
somebody will run and throw a bomb.
And somebody had told them
that optical fiber no electromagnetic wave
can penetrate which we knew and maybe it can,
if you can make that it will be something that
nobody will be able to disturb and communication
will be very sound very good. They challenged us
to make a system like this and I took
it upon myself say sure we'll build a system.
So, our dream about fiber optics and all this
talk was following up that power-line carrier
communication which was carrying
multiplexing 11 voice signals on a cable.
Here we are able to do hundreds of voice signals
on a cable and here we are actually backed down
to where bandwidth didn't matter where distance
did not matter and we are going to do this
we took upon ourselves to build a system like this.
I don't remember who had funded it, but we built it.
And as we were building it
Rajesh Sanghi who was a M. Tech student from Air Force
deputed here, he was already becoming close
to me and he started working on this project.
And we built this project and having a Air Force officer
and was a huge help because he will do all
the interface with CVRD and with the army officers
and was able to do much better than we could.
He would go get it deployed in the tank test it out,
claimed do everything
and the system was doing very well.
Of course, a tragedy took place
then one day we heard that he was doing this
and the tank was running and they were going and
they will go through difficult terrain tank would,
it was a main battle tank and
it was a just about being tested
and while doing it the tank overturned.
And Rajesh Sanghi hit got hit
his bone here was broken.
Well he was hospitalized, he was cheerful,
he didn't blame us and for him
this is a part of being in the armed forces,
Air Force you get injured this will heal
and we did realize that this will heal.
But it was also clear that with this
small defect that he has in hand
he won't be promoted very high
because there was a rule in these
armed forces and Air Force that up to a certain
rank walls only you can go if you have had
some kind of injury which stays permanent.
So, he was very bright officers did quite well
in the exam man courses and did everything
and done the project.
What will he do?
Meantime we also saw him as a great asset
to our system building effort that here is a person who
would be able to not only translate the defence ideas to us,
but be able to also carry it all the way
to the inside the defence.
And we were now getting contracts from defence you
build this system, build something for aircraft
15 53, 17 73 bus fiber optic system
and we are quite willing to take up this things,
we had by this time 30, 40 people working with us.
I remember we are making we had made
2 megabyte per second system,
8 megabyte per second system,
34 megabyte per second were
just about getting to build.
And we proposed a project I think it was a
Ministry of Electronics plus some defence agency
was also there and we said we will go and build
140 megabyte per second it was state of art
nobody else in the world was in built a
one more 40 megabyte per second.
And I remember going to the meeting in Delhi
it was at IIT Delhi making a presentation,
he says there is nothing here that we don't understand
and I had learnt how to build multiplexing and
everything quite well and the basic challenge is in
actually doing things.
So, we will fail a few times, but
we are better positioned to build
this than any other person.
If any other person can build it in the country
we will be happy we are not the,
but if nobody else can we need to.
Otherwise, forever we will be dependent
and not only one ah megabyte per second
tomorrow 565 everything will be imported
and when I said all this with my passion
they immediately sanctioned plus projects.
So, we had enough money we had large money.
Fortunately, number of our alumni also
were get particularly the ones who were very friendly to us
people like Deepak Khanchandani
who would come back to us.
He they had joined semiconductor complex
the place closed down did not do very well
he was lost and he would come back to us
and work with us. So, we had talent,
we had people we were able to take
students from engineering colleges nearby;
we were able to take students from
engineering colleges nearby.
By that time that had started proliferating
and we were able to train them and do well.
But to be able to do some of these things
we wanted Doctor Sanghi to be with us.
He says you will love to do his PhD with me,
but how does he do that?
Defence will Air Force will not release him,
but we had enough defence project.
So, I remember we had gone all the way
to the scientific Professor I think Abdul Kalam at that time
the DRDO head and myself Professor Raina
went and said we can build all these things we need him to be.
He will do his PhD also please permit him
hence I knew that if you were honest and
speaking and were ready to do something the rules
can be bend and this is what Professor Indiresan
used to always teach us.
You know there are these rules you must understand that,
if you go and try to hit against the rules
you will never be able to penetrate him
there is a huge barrier,
you have to learn to bend the rules.
Ok, it's interesting that you say it because
there is a story I have heard when uh Professor Paulraj
again coming from defence was doing his
M. Tech at IIT Delhi under Professor Indiresan
he saw that Paulraj was very bright,
he wanted him to continue for PhD
and rules didn't permit and he somehow got the rules bent.
So, that Paulraj continues for his PhD
and built the sonar is what I I mean
I don't know if the story is correct,
but this story I have heard.
Must be correct Professor Indiresan
always taught us he will always point out.
And by the time; by the time guidance
and counselling unit had happened he was
I was quite close to him and as I told you
he tried to teach a course also along with me.
And I could reach him and he was very
enthused that I am just trying to do this
he was fully encouraging us.
Let me tell you the rest of the department was
not very friendly to Professor Raina
there was a huge conflict and since
I was working with Professor Raina
they used to also watch me with huge
kind of suspicion.
But people like Professor Radhakrishna Rao,
Professor V G K Murthy
is to know that I am very sincere and
used to kind of encourage me.
So, here we are able to get Doctor Sanghi
and he became one of my early PhD students
of course, I had one or two other one person had
worked on surface acoustic devices one.
Thing about this me I had done my PhD
in surface acoustical devices this is where I could
easily do work publish I did not need anything
except computers I had my first PhD
student Elizabeth Elias who did her PhD work with me.
Actually largely it was understanding this
and then software programming,
but I was bored with that work.
And here is a much more interesting work
that I was doing whether I was doing for main
battle tank or for the aircraft or for
doing things, I got more interested
in fiber optics and system development.
If you remember it was in the process of
doing this that I made a
fiber optic multiplexing kit.
I have taught in United States
for 2 years only and I was teaching here
I knew our students were brighter,
but there was one difference their labs
they used to learn much more than our labs.
Our labs were very boring routine
there was one instrument
that was expensive and we would only take
people and somebody will operate
that instrument and they will take reading
there is no fun very little learning,
this is something that I had
noticed about labs here.
Whereas lab in United States where
there was some kind of full kit given to each
student individually.
And a problem will be given to them
and they will have to build it and is
saw they were used to do it
we used to give them a week before,
they used to prepare for it come,
we'll have a discussion in the beginning,
get them going in the middle of this
we will go around each desk, help them.
There is a huge learning for them and for us
out here the labs had no learning.
The students were bored, they used to cut corners.
I had been talking to head of the department
other senior faculty that why can't we create,
so many kits and people
sort of said well we don't have money.
So, this kind of inspired me that
we can build the kits and make it low cost.
And since I had learned enough about
multiplexing a lot of interesting things
you can teach about multiplexing,
the synchronisation, lack of synchronisation,
bit synchronisation, byte synchronisation,
clock synchronisation, failure of that,
multiplexing, channel switching time switching
all of this you could do in a fiber optic kit.
And I had got a undergraduate student
to work with me to build that kit
and we had commercialised that.
I will talk more about it initially
with universal then with my benchmark systems
I will talk more about it, till today
I am known in colleges all over the country
as a person who had designed that kit.
Even today I get 40 year 35 years
down the line I we every year
get some royalties on that kit.
That kit has taught simple multiplexing and
communication to very large
number of people all over the country.
We'll come back to that later on,
but what I was pointing out that we were
building systems initially for defence and
for Minister of Electronics and building
complex system and used to employ a
large number of people.
At the same time the industry was showing some interest.
So, while I used to work on this defence project
and other projects with Professor Raina
some industries were coming to me personally
and I was in laser communication lab
building some of the projects and employing them.
There is a interesting thing that I want to point out
it's about India and about Tamil Nadu.
In my first year after I came here
very often I will find that somebody
totally unknown to me comes to me
with his son or a daughter
15, 16 year old son and daughter
they will somehow get to meet me.
And basically talk to me only one thing
meet my son meet, see my daughter,
how bright they are, how well they are doing in school
they want to study engineering,
get them admission in IIT,
help them get the admission.
By knew now I knew enough about JE of course
I myself was had done JE I knew that IIT
there was not no possibility and I used to
sort of say they have to write this exam they said
they will not get through.
Then I said well then you have to go to other colleges
and they will say they are not there are no
colleges and they are we cannot get in.
At that time '82 or '83 I '82 I remember
doing some study and I found that there were hardly about
100 engineering colleges around the country
having only 20,000 students.
That time we are closing to 800 million population
20,000 students, people were hungry
to learn there are no engineering colleges.
And this is a time '84 or '85, '84
probably or '85 MGR and Jayalalitha came up
with a policy of private engineering colleges,
set up this private engineering colleges.
IIT was huge was fully opposed to it
everybody used to sort of say there will be poor teacher,
poor quality, it is a money making,
they will take large amount of money.
And it was truth also many of these
colleges were very poor quality,
money making proposition for some politicians.
But there are also colleges which were
attempting to teach them.
Initially I was opposing that just like
any other IIT, but soon realized that
when we have denied the children opportunity
to learn engineering and this is providing them
is it fair on our part to oppose them.
Remember this is the first the time
here the IIT ecosystem says that
we should oppose them quality; quality; quality,
superiority first time started questioning all of these things.
Partly my PPSD background probably helped
and I had to often stand against our own colleagues
and sort of say no you should allow them.
And you know incidentally what helped
that children of many of the faculty.
yeah who are not getting into IIT and
were trying to send it to this
started siding with me,
what I am pointing out that I this is the; this is the first time
and I was very young at that time,
I stood against IIT opinion.
Long run I think it was a very very important thing,
I started talking about it.
Of course, process was going on independent of me,
but this large number of engineering colleges were coming up
and these youngsters were getting trained.
And we suddenly found that we will I will be able to
recruit them as a project staff for our M. Tech or
things like that and they were doing very well,
they of course, I realized by now that
there were some colleges where they will getting some minimum
training not enough.
But the youngsters were
very bright after all the students who got into IIT
and didn't get into IIT the marked difference was hardly anything
by now I had figured out the whole JE
there was hardly anything they were
very bright they didn't get the opportunity.
And you provided them opportunity in your lab
initially in fiber Optics Communication Lab
laser on later on Laser Communication Lab
and they will flower up.
And I already had seen
our M. Tech students who came from tier 2. Colleges
Colleges were doing well.
And suddenly I found that
well all you need to do is give them opportunity
push them train them hard you have to do a little more
personal handholding create
confidence that they are doing big things.
And they will come become very good technologist.
This was a very important lesson that I
learned as early as '86, '87, '88
which I actually continued.
And whether I did
whatever I have done till from that time till today
that that there is a law in India
the biggest strength it is human resources.
Yes IIT is one thing, but it doesn't matter
that is very large I was not now bothered that
IIT students will go abroad let them.
There are enough others; there are enough others
and all that we need to do is train them
push them hard and they will deliver
this is something that we saw
do happening again and again.
I will tell you couple of other things that happened
which actually started changing my whole
mind frame which you will see.
Two incidents I remember was happening in India
other than the engineering college,
you know at that time the only washing powder that
we had in India was Surf or known.
I used to also buy that it was expensive.
So, I used to buy and use it occasionally
rest of the time used to use the soap
and that time suddenly we heard of Nirma,
huge advertisement in radio
and think that you will hear about Nirma
it is a very poor quality washing powder,
it will burn your hands.
Very similar to the way we IIT will talk about it's
private engineering college is a very
similar putting down this,
but large number it was very inexpensive one fourth
the price of
and I started was occasionally using
it little care and it cleaned.
It had a little more bleaching so
it hurt the hand a bit you have to care be careful,
it cleaned the clothes very well of course it
hurt the clothes also in long run, but
how did it matter.
I certainly found that Nirma crossed the total sales
on Surf and became the dominant
and Surf was going on opposing with all
intellectuals like us supporting them this is a
quality product and that is poor quality.
And suddenly we found after some time
when the that will nearly lost the market from
dominant situation that they came with a cheaper
powder very similar to Nirma powder.
And then we realized that what
India is I learnt about India that India
is a large market for affordable product.
Surf was only to service 4, 5
percent of our population,
high cost similar to maybe the cost abroad
only a few percentage of people will be able to afford it.
But if you are able to get the product at the right
price point the market becomes very large and new
industries can come up.
It gave a huge
huge impetus to me that new industries can be
created only if you can make
product which are affordable.
Whole scenario thinking started changing
a second very similar incident took place
with telecom by that time
Rajiv Gandhi was in power hm and he brought
this person Sam Pitroda from somewhere.
And I remember getting invited in one meeting
because I was doing enough with industry and all that.
And that is a place where he was talking about
why number of telephones are limited and you
cannot uh give enough phones and
you know making a long distance call.
I remember in IIT Kanpur
I in my 5 years I made 2 calls to home.
The reason number one I had to wait between 4 to 6 hours
to after booking a call to get a call,
I had to wait outside the telephone exchange
you will book and you will wait outside
and you will get a call suddenly the trunk call is now available
and you can make a call.
The cost of that call was equivalent to
30 percent of my monthly mess bill
one call, you could neither afford
and you had a long waiting period.
So, in one of the conversation that took place in Delhi
with Sam Pitroda people pointed out yes
number of trunk lines are limited and by the way
where we are building power-line carrier communication
or fiber optic multiplexing primarily to increase the
number of trunk lines between cities
that was the objective by that time
I had understood.
If we can build that enough we can,
but it was expensive and so the calls will be expensive.
Till somebody pointed out
then in the night time these were hardly ever used,
it was empty and the telephones were not available
and that time in one of the meeting
basically the idea came that why can't
we create this FL telephone we will put a
telephone at a FL shop and people will
go and make a call pay for it.
And maybe in the night time we will make STD
calls at evening time half rate
night time quarter rates
everybody in department was opposed loss of revenue
this that same thing that you hear,
Sam Pitroda took the decision I will do that.
And I remember he is asking me that,
but you know my STD PCO machine is expensive.
Can you build a low cost metering
which will tell how much is the bill,
so that the person can pay?
And I think we took up and I was I remember
there was one one Sanjay Gupta undergraduate student
with him actually I built that
and I gave it to him in the meantime
multiple things were built and this STD PCO started
what is very interesting this STD
PCO started and very soon it was there
in every street corner we had initially planned
10,000 of them it became 100,000
and more many more.
This STD PCO really moved me because
what I found I myself could go there and make calls,
but people used to stand in queues
to make call in the evenings
they used to wait for 8 PM.
And then 11 PM. Yeah
And people will make calls and
people are very happy and it was became affordable.
So, I suddenly saw affordability has huge power
and this STD PCO person was actually
making enough money initially the government had talked about
subsidy very soon it was forgotten this FL,
it it was no longer a FL shop
it became a STD PCO itself
and the person started selling multiple other things. Yeah
the business grew these were entrepreneurs who were growing
and we had suddenly created
I think a million PCOs over that 2, 3 years.
We went to remote areas and created that,
that area will get developed there are enough storeys
that I remember going through
where in a remote area this place will do.
Because there is a now STD PCO
there the women will be more easy ready to
come and first the all the
car auto repair shops will come around,
people will make it a taxi stand, bus stand will come
some small factories will set up.
Women will be more ready to come and work there
because that phone provided them safety
and that whole area will develop.
I suddenly realize that entrepreneurship
both with Nirma and this STD PCO is
what India needs affordable technology
is what India needs entrepreneurship
and affordable technology will make India grow
more rapidly than anything else,
by this time my dream of or thinking that politics
will change things had gone.
Now, I have totally I mean particularly after that
Sikh riots that took place completely shook me.
And then the Bhopal gas FL I knew
politics is not the right thing.
And entrepreneurship and affordable
technology developed in India.
Training the human strength resources our biggest strength
creating large human resources engineering manpower,
training them IIT cannot remain in its own
elite structure, it has to reach out to them,
work with them masters,
but project staff
project staff became very important.
Train them, take up projects, do things, work with industry,
transform industry this basically
was my early learning from 1981 till '86, '87.
Entrepreneurship will become the best way
for countries development.
Affordable technology is the only way
that India will developed its market.
And India has large market
if the products are affordable,
it can change the game
and we have to believe on our human resources.
My thinking considerably changed
and it is at this stage that I started
looking at larger issues.
And very fortunately
after a lot of battle within the department,
I said we have to allow people to come in
7 years, 8 years before me
nobody had come, 7 years after I came nobody.
Joined or 6 years till we pulled in and I helped
in getting Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Anthony Reddy asked me.
to get it and I somehow pushed it.
Professor Indiresan tried his best to change IIT
this place was too conservative would not allow him to change.
That conservative trend continues even today
and is a huge difference between IIT Kanpur
and IIT madras in that.
Even today if we are not doing better than
what we should it is because of that conservatism.
And one thing that I learnt that you have to fight against
conservating you have to take risk.
And whether we did wireless in local loop or where we did
this we started incubating companies Banyan,
Midas whether we created research park
or incubation cell or our work electric vehicles
or solar DC was always defying the
tradition I am doing something new.
Another thing I would like to end today
by stating that if you see from surface acoustic wave
I had got into digital circuits and systems,
microprocessor based systems,
fiber optic systems and next was wireless.
If you say I had never stayed in one area.
In fact, my 8 PhD students have worked in 8
totally different areas everything you start from
scratch and do it.
This is not what IIT does,
IIT to some extent doesn't even respect that.
this whole thing that you have to publish,
yes you have to be in a one area,
you have to build the ecosystem their whole
what is this called h index etcetera comes from all that
here you are jumping from one thing to another.
I had made my path very clear
that I am not going to follow the tradition
and I will fight against all conservative thing
and in spite of everything I will do,
IIT continues to be conservative
and still becomes a bottleneck on many things.
I have questions on that, I think we we will take it up
about how you know this this this 2 models
of university based education or
research you know we can reconcile, yes.
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