Abhishek’s epitome of love to his mother, will surely win your hearts

Rajavva, Abhishek’s mother is a labourer in the paddy centre in Hanumajipet village, Telangana. Her job is to fill gunny bags with grains and she doesn’t work alone. It takes at least three people hours together to fill the gunny bags with the day’s quota of grains. It is tedious work but workers like Rajavva do not have any other option but to persevere. Abhishek, grew up watching his mother struggle at the centre. Six months ago his father migrated to Dubai to look for employment.

When the opportunity to participate in the National Level Inspire Science Exhibition (NLISE) held at IIT-Delhi arose, Abhishek, a class 8 student at the Zilla Parishad School, decided to participate with a machine that he had conceived to help ease his mother’s struggles.

He had a basic idea of what could help hamalis (labourers) like his mother fill gunny bags faster and with minimal effort. Though the idea had already germinated in the 13-year-old’s head, he needed guidance to build a working model. That’s where Venkatesham, a teacher at the Zilla Parishad school stepped in to aid and abet the young innovator.

After a few trials and errors, Abhishek designed a paddy-filling device that reduced manual labour, thereby easing the work of the labourer.

Two wheels, an iron-sheet, iron pipe rods and a weighing machine go into creating the machine that costs between Rs 5000- 7000.

IPS officer, Akun Sabharwal, who is encouraging Abhishek to polish his design told The Better India, “The paddy-filling machine, primarily made of metal, has an opening on one side. An inlet area attached to a lever allows the paddy to be collected in it. The lever is then tilted completely to allow the grains to slide to the other side. A gunny bag is attached here to be filled.”

One gunny bag usually contains about 42 kg of paddy and one can imagine the labour that goes into filling it. Sabharwal further explained that Abhishek’s simple yet brilliant innovation completes the work faster and requires less number of people.

Abhishek won the third place at the NLISE and received a cash prize of Rs 10,000 as well as a laptop. But that was not all.

Abhishek’s story will remain as a best example for his age group students and others to achieve goals and think innovatively towards desired goals.