Jugaad

Jugaad a vehicle made of water pumpsets

Jugaad (Hindi: जुगाड़ Punjabi(gharuka)) are locally made motor vehicles that are used mostly in small villages as a means of low cost transportation in India. Jugaad literally means an arrangement or a work around, which have to be used because of lack of resources. This is a Hindi term also widely used by people speaking other Indian languages, and people of Indian origin around the world. The same term is still used for a type of vehicle, found in rural India. This vehicle is made by carpenters, by fitting a diesel engine on a cart.

A Jugaad carrying passengers to a political rally in Agra, India

Cost

Jugaad cost around Rs. 20,000 (less than US$ 400). They are known for having poor brakes and can not go beyond 60 km/h. They operate on diesel fuel and are just ordinary water pump sets converted into engine.

The brakes of these vehicles very often fail and one of the passengers jumps down and applies a manual wooden block as a brake. These vehicles do not have any vehicle registration plate as they are not registered with the Regional Transport Office (RTO). Hence, they end up not paying any road tax.

Jugaad Engine and start-up procedure

"Jugaad" is also colloquial Hindi word that can mean an innovative fix,often pejoratively used for solutions that bend rules, or a resource that can be used as such or a person who can solve a vexatious issue. It is used as much for enterprising street mechanics as for political fixers. In essence, though it is a tribute to native genius, and lateral thinking.

Even though in everyday life, a Jugaad can be a solution, in context of Management, Jugaad is essentially a person who has some special capability or access to a resource or even access to another Jugaad that can be useful under extreme or special circumstances.

A Jugaadu person is one who has numerous useful and cashable Jugaads.

References

• http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13754045
• Channel News Asia
• Barun S. Mitra, India’s ‘Informal’ Car, Asian Wall Street Journal, page 10, Jan. 26, 1995.
• Small news/disscusion Group
• Future of the Jugad
• Jugad Photos
• [1] for Jugaad the Verb

See also

• Rickshaw
• Tonga_(carriage)
• Transport in India