Indian Innovators (18 page)

“The tests were worth a few lakh rupees and ate into all my savings. The living expenses in Coimbatore were higher; so, I started working 10 hours each day at the workshop and even sold my blood at times to make ends meet. Even after working long hours in the workshop, I would devote at least two hours per day to my research.

I worked very hard to determine what made this cellulose so special, how it was manufactured and how it could be replicated using locally available material.

During the investigation, I found out that the cellulose extraction process required machines worth several crores. Thus, the technology created high barriers to entry for small players. It was obvious then that I had to create a sanitary napkin of the same quality without using cellulose.

Over the next two years, I perfected the blend of cotton and thickness of the pad by trial and error. I also developed all the machines required to process the cotton, and press and package it into usable pads.

Finally, in 2005, seven years after I had begun my quest for affordable sanitary napkins, I patented the product and the process with the help of National Innovation Foundation. I also sent my technology to IIT Madras for evaluation and their seal of approval, so that there is more credibility.”

IIT Madras did not just approve it; they awarded it the Best Social Innovation of the Year. Soon, the local Tamil media was flush with news on how a school dropout was set to change the lives of millions of women across the country.

When the news of his success reached his wife and mother, both of them decided to come back. Many of the people, who had earlier ridiculed him, could not stop singing his praises now and would often tell him that they always knew that he would make it big one day.

“Everybody expected me to make a lot of money. I received offers from multinationals on several occasions to sell the technology to them for a hefty sum, but I declined each time.

I am the son of a poor handloom weaver and I have seen the worst of poverty. The struggle to create the sanitary pad took me through hell. If I could survive all that, I am sure I do not need so much money.

I lead a simple life and have learned to live with scarce resources. I am very happy with whatever I have, but I want to create opportunities to make life better for rural women.”

For this purpose, he started Jayashree Industries, a company that manufactures the sanitary pad making machines. The machines are sold to women self-help groups in rural areas. The price of the machine depends on its manufacturing capacity, and varies from
75,000 for a machine that produces 500 pads per day to
200,000 for one that produces 3,000 per day. The women are trained to operate the machines, educate their prospective buyers about the benefits of the product and manage inventory and sales.

All raw materials are sourced locally. Each of the selfhelp groups sells the napkins under their own local brand name, which enhances their sense of identity, pride and independence. The napkins are sold door-to-door, which is convenient for users and saves them the embarrassment of asking for the product at a provision store. If a daily-wage earner would like to buy a single pad, the women sellers do not mind opening up the packet and selling a single piece. They even sell the pads in a barter exchange. Thus, while MNCs use a centralized and standardized marketing and distribution model for their branded sanitary napkins, these sanitary napkins are delivered through a multi-brand, decentralized, customizable model.

The raw material and processing costs
1 per pad and the labor and other overheads add another 50 paise. The pads are sold at
2 per piece, almost one-fifth of the price charged by most MNCs. The women in the self-help groups are able to earn
5,000-10,000 per month, depending on sales. This is much higher than the
2,000-3,000 they would make as agricultural laborers. Many of them can now afford to send their children to school.

The process involves grinding raw cotton bales into finer fibers in a grinding bucket. The ground cotton is then weighed and separated into 100 g piles, each of which is sufficient for 10 pads. The cotton is then put into rectangular molds. A pneumatic press is used to press three pads at a time. The pressed cotton pads are then attached to a plastic liner using super-bond glue. A very fine cloth is then wrapped around the pad and heat-sealed. The finished napkins are UV sterilized, put inside peel-off paper and packed. They are sold in packs of eight in a plastic bag that carries the local branding of the self-help group manufacturing them.

Today, the enterprise involves almost 10,000 rural women organized into 843 self-help groups, spread across 27 Indian states and some other developing countries such as Bhutan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Zimbabwe and South Africa. So far, it is estimated that 3.5 million women have been converted to sanitary pad users by these self-help groups.

Muruganantham has also set up a sanitary pad making machine in an NGO-run girls’ school in Anupshaher, Uttar Pradesh. Thus, girls enrolled in the school are educated about sexual hygiene and are also incentivized to not drop out of school, because they get to earn some money through making and selling sanitary napkins.

With help from the National Rural Health Mission, he has installed pad-vending machines in some areas, which dispense pads in exchange of a two-rupee coin.

In 2009, Muruganantham received a prize from President Pratibha Patil for his innovation. Since then, he has received scores of awards for inclusive innovation, social entrepreneurship, women empowerment and rural upliftment.

He is now a subject of case studies in management campuses across the world and often finds himself flying from one city to another, delivering talks at prestigious forums.

Until 2009, Muruganantham could not speak much English and relied on interpreters to deliver his talks around the world. However, because a lot is lost in translation, he decided to learn the language himself. Nothing seems impossible for this man, who now enthralls audiences from London to Los Angeles with his patchy but witty English.

Menstrual Man,
a documentary on his life and work, was released in 2013. The film has been shown in several schools and film festivals across the world, and has been much appreciated. The funds generated from the film were utilized to fund generators for production for some of the self-help groups, because they get only a few hours of electricity daily.

Despite all the fame, Muruganantham has his eyes set on the distant goal of making India a country where all menstruating women use sanitary napkins; providing livelihood to one million rural women and even producing low-cost baby and adult diapers.

Deepak Ravindran – CEO, Innoz Technologies