This month’s IBEF newsletter highlights a low-budget innovation that could fundamentally improve the lives of millions:

Manoj Mondal is the inventor of the crank pedal – he successfully tweaked the pedal of a bicycle to an extent that it generates almost double the torque (force multiplied by the distance from the centre) than in normal circumstances. In other words, the speed of the bicycle increases from, say, 20 km/hr to 40 km/hr.

His feat has already made him the toast of incubators, the green lobby and a host of companies which are coming forward to adapt Mondal’s technology commercially.

Besides, Mondal’s invention is slated to benefit rickshaw-pullers as the Centre for Rural Development has shown keenness to convert 10,000 rickshaws into the crank pedal mode this year…Dr Pradip K Sarmah, executive director of the Centre for Rural Development is banking on the crank pedal “to reduce the drudgery of the 10 million rickshaw-puller of India” . The centre runs a Rickshaw Bank to cater to the urban poor, and already has an improvised rickshaw by IIT-Guwahati, which costs Rs 12,000 a pop with insurance, licence, uniform and the works thrown in. “Mondal’s invention will add speed to the existing force and cost Rs 100 extra,” contends Sarmah.

Next, he’s working on a prototype where pedaling on a stationary cycle has the potential to dig a bore deep enough to make a drain, and construction major Escorts seems to have shown interest in the new technology, says Mondal.