: Sister’s Cancer Inspires Blacksmith to Make Smokeless Chulha That Saves 60% Fuel #IndiaNEWS #Innovation Every year news that Northern India is choked with air pollution caused by poisonous gases

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Sister’s Cancer Inspires Blacksmith to Make Smokeless Chulha That Saves 60% Fuel #IndiaNEWS #Innovation
Every year news that Northern India is choked with air pollution caused by poisonous gases emitting from vehicles and stubble burning by farmers makes headlines. But the situation in the far Northeast is no different.
According to a Lancet report, about 56 per cent of the population in the Northeastern states suffer from chronic diseases caused by the burning of solid fuels — the highest in India.
But for Maidem Deben Singh, a native of Imphal, this was not limited to just reading a fact in an international research journal. The effects of the harmful smoke emitting from coal while cooking led to his sister being diagnosed with lung cancer.
Learning of his sister’s disease had a life-changing impact on Deben. It was then that he decided to become an innovator and prevent others from inhaling harmful gases emitted from the chulha (traditional stove).
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A Class 7 dropout, Deben followed in his father’s footsteps to work as a jeep driver with the State Government Department. Deben could not pursue education owing to his family’s financial condition. In the early 1970s, he joined the profession and worked for nearly three decades. But the commute to his job and his hectic lifestyle forced him to quit. He also worked as a labourer at construction sites around 2005 and then to reduce physical labour, he became a blacksmith.
But it was in 2011 that he learned about the health issues of his sister. “I learned from the doctors treating my sister about how smoke from a traditional stove causes lung cancer. I felt terrible and decided to find a solution to the problem. Like my sister, many women were suffering from the same,� he says.
Around 2012 Deben decided to use his smithing skills in building a stove that emits less smoke.
Deben struggled for months to make a stove using aluminium and steel sheets and welding material. “I had a challenging time creating the inner chambers and channelising the heat in required directions. Eventually, I succeeded. Not only was it smokeless, but the stove also reduced the fuel requirement offering health and monetary benefits to the user,� he says.
The 70-year-old adds, “I built a prototype in a secluded place without letting others know. Once it was ready, I informed my son, Thoithoi. A year later, we named it Emionu stove and displayed it in an Innovation Exhibition organised by the Central Government at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Delhi. �
However, while demonstrating it to the visitors, Deben faced an unexpected issue. “The stove was mounted on a plastic table, and the heat from the bottom started melting the material.

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