Thiruvananthapuram: ‘Bandicoot’, the manhole cleaning robot aimed at putting an end to manual scavenging, has got further fillip with popular actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan congratulating the innovative project. “The robot to clean human refuse is India's first step towards dignity to co-human beings. Congrats Kerala,” said a tweet by Kamal Haasan on Wednesday. The tweet received over 15,000 likes and over 2,800 re-tweets in 24 hours, most of which appreciated the effort of the Kerala-based start-up Genrobotics that brought out ‘Bandicoot.’
There were also some comments on other initiatives on motorised manhole cleaning while many highlighted the need for ending manual scavenging. “Manual scavenging is outlawed in India, yet thousands of people are still engaged in the work and many die cleaning sewers. According to the Safai Karmachari Andolan, a movement to eradicate manual scavenging, at least 1,470 manual scavengers died at work between 2010 and 2017,” said a tweet.
Screenshot of Kamal Haasan’s tweet.
Genrobotics has already received queries about ‘Bandicoot’ from different states including Tamil Nadu. It had also made a presentation at a recent national workshop which was attended by Union minister for drinking water and sanitation Uma Bharati and also hopes to get a chance to make a presentation before Prime Minister Narendra Modi soon. Meanwhile, Genrobotics chief executive officer Vimal Govind said the firm was looking for establishing a manufacturing hub for the robot in any of the industrial parks in the state. It also plans to bring out an advanced version of ‘Bandicoot’ which would be more compact and user-friendly.
