VSBK and the Art of Building Brick Kilns

In my knowledge, there are very few people who can manage to make scientific data as interesting as Dr Arun Kumar. A metallurgist by profession, Arun Kumar has worked in various capacities in Britain and India in the field of atomic energy. Having married a lawyer from Delhi, he started a company making electrical parts and items. Dissatisfied with the turn that his life had taken, he joined development Alternatives (DA) a non-government organisation.

Arun Kumar then drew a small salary but like all creative people, he is a trifle eccentric. Now his interests are quite varied and include making handmade paper from waste, better looms for weavers, generating electricity from cattle waste, and sundry other technical things that help improve socio-economic development of society.

I met Arun Kumar after a long time, and was quite curious as to what he did now. Like me, Arun too enjoys his drink. This doesn’t seem to hamper his scientific temprament, but certainly increases my diabetes. Rum is his favourite poison.

‘Among other things, I also make bricks,’ Arun said. I was nonplussed. I let out an intelligent-sounding inarticulate grunt, which he easily interpreted to mean interest in the topic.

‘Do you know how much coal we manage to burn in our Indian brick kilns?’ I conveyed my utter lack of knowledge in this regard. ‘Every year, 160, 00,000 tonnes. This figure is minus the 25, 00,000 dung cakes and wood,’ Arun informed me. ‘Do you also know that as opposed to the technology used in India, the Chinese brick-making technology saves 30 times the energy? If applied and managed correctly, manufacturing bricks through this technology will save on 50,00,000 tonnes of coal every year?’

Arun continued to bombard me with statistics and I must confess, I am not a man of figures. I am also not completely ignorant on the manner in which bricks are made. I knew that the burnt-brick was first made around 3000 BC in Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq. As a child I had seen the kilns in my village. Later, when in the name of progress, construction was on the rise in rural areas, and mud and clay houses gave way to permanent dwellings, brick kilns appeared in villages like ugly gashes on the face of the earth. A common feature was the tall chimneys which were dismantled and rebuilt a little distance from the earlier spot with monotonous regularity. I did wonder as to the reason why.

Now I asked Arun the same question. He replied, ‘In traditional Indian kilns, prior to firing the clay, the bricks are sorted out in piles, with more bricks under the mounds and few above. A fire pit is built under these mounds with a path made for the fire to run its course. The heat being more intense under the mound, there are more bricks under than above, where the heat is less. In this technique, the bricks are fired unequally. The brick kilns with the shifting chimneys are called Bulls Trench Kilns (BTK). Here, the unbaked bricks are placed in tunnels under the mound, and when lit, the fire runs in and around all the tunnels, baking the bricks in its way.’

‘And what do the Chinese do?’ I asked. ‘Yes, the Chinese, instead of moving the fire around, rotate the bricks in their places, ensuring uniform firing. This Vertical Shaft Brick Kiln (VSBK) technique fires each brick in exactly the same manner, much like an apple pie baked in a 5-star restaurant.’

Arun paused awhile before he continued. ‘Development Alternatives built the first kiln of this kind with the help of the Chinese in Datia, Bundelkhand way back in 1995.’ Most of the descriptions of the technical kind were beyond my comprehension, but a story relating to the Henan County Research Institute, headed by Professor Yin Yu Fan was quite interesting. It is quite symbolic of the reason as to why the Chinese have progressed in the manner that they have, and why we are yet to keep pace with their way of work. The story goes somewhat like this.

Bundelkhand is quite a natural choice for the brick-making industry. The soil is of the appropriate quality, the technique not be up to par, and the workforce not capital intensive, but labour oriented. It was in Bundelkhand that DA decided to improve the condition of brick making technique in India.

In association with the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), and spearheaded by Professor Yin Yu Fan, a five-member delegation of experts arrived in India. The goal was to build a Vertical shaft Brick Kiln (VSBK) near Datia, 35 km from Jhansi towards New Delhi.

The Chinese delegation was taken to a hotel in Jhansi. On the first evening of their stay, the delegation was invited over to dinner by the regional representative, Wing Commander Pramod Sahney. The host had arranged for a generous evening of drinks. Over a dinner consisting of, among other things, fish and chicken, the guests enquired whether there was any pork in the menu. The hosts regretfully declined. Later on, a separate kitchen was arranged where the Chinese delegation could cook their food the way they liked it. The Chinese team seemingly had no qualms over imbibing the generous amount of intoxicants and cheerfully downed the lot. Arun Kumar, circumspect when it comes to drinking, did wonder whether the guests would be able to rise early the next morning. He need not have wondered, for the next morning found the Chinese team ready and waiting with their faculties fully intact. The first lesson learnt from the Chinese: You may drink like a fish and eat like a pig, provided you don’t turn into one and are prepared to work like a mule.

At the worksite, the experts decreed a 12-hour shift. The local masons and labourers were appointed for the work, which started at a furious pace. The Chinese engineers worked at the same pace as the locals. One day, the labourers were absent and the masons sat idle. When the engineer- in-charge of liaising with the experts and the locals arrived on the scene, he was summarily asked to help tote the bricks. When he refused to in indulge in the menial task, he was asked to either pitch in or be banned from the site. The Indian engineer had no choice whatsoever. The second lesson learnt from the Chinese: If need be, never shirk to work like a labourer should the need arise.

There was a local contractor called Ahmad whose job was to mediate between the labour and the rest. One day, Ahmad came to see Arun Kumar. With a great deal of trepidation he said that according to the villagers, some of the local dogs were missing. He did not mean that the Indian dogs had taken a rabid dislike to the Chinese team and had run off in a huff, but that the Indian dogs had landed on the Chinese plates. Arun categorically and furiously told him off.

The kiln was ready before time. Having acknowledged the gratitude of the Indians, the Chinese team went back home. Professor Fan promised to return in a year’s time to see the progress of the kiln. Producing 4500 bricks every day, the kiln worked like a dream. When the Professor returned after a year, he was given a warm welcome. In a dinner given in the guest’s honour, Arun Kumar could not contain himself and told him about the rumour regarding the missing Indian dogs. ‘Oh yes, Indian dogs are very tasty’, the Professor enthused. Completely taken aback, Arun managed to say, ‘How so?’ The reply was, ‘Well, Indian dogs are vegetarians, no? Their meat is delicious.’ The third lesson learnt from the Chinese: If you want Chinese technology, you must get used to their cuisine. An Indianised version will just not do.

In the last seven years, a total of 18 kilns have been put up, and according to Dr Arun Kumar, they all run well, quite unlike the Russian fighter aircrafts. The fourth lesson learnt from the Chinese: It is better to import Chinese technology than to rely on the Russians. q

Courtesy
K. Bikram Singh

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