A Businessman’s Dilemma

(Photo created with AI assistance may not physically resemble apparatus actually made)

I want to narrate here an episode in my professional life as an electronic equipment designer and also a businessman. I think that this episode is rather noteworthy, because sometimes projects need to be taken up even when it is known that it is an outright wrong business-wise decision. In this case, the technical excellence and elegance of an idea won over the value of business and profit margins.

Sometimes in early 1970’s, I received a letter from Mr. Gadgil, our dealer in Mumbai. The contents were rather unusual. According to him, Physics Department of University of Bombay had recently included at that time, a new experiment in the “Practicals” curriculum for the B Sc. Degree course in Physics.  This experiment was described as, ‘e/m of an electron using a magic eye indicator’.  Mr. Gadgil had further added that he had made enquiries with colleges and other traders. Unfortunately, no one in the Physics departments of affiliated colleges knew anything about this experiment. Similarly, no scientific instrument manufacturer in India was making any such apparatus with which this experiment can be carried out.   E/m of an electron is a physical constant with a value Coulombs per kilogram.

After reading this letter, my first reaction was to find out whether to spend resources on such unknown product would make any business sense or not?   I wrote to Mr. Gadgil regarding the possible purchase price of a suitable apparatus that the colleges may afford and would be willing to buy.  And what would be total volume of the possible business?  After a few days, Mr. Gadgil gave me rough indications for both these, which I found ridiculously low, almost a pittance!  At that time there were only 26 affiliated colleges with University of Bombay offering a degree in Physics. All of which were unlikely to buy this new apparatus.  Besides this, no other University in India had included this experiment in their Physics degree curriculum till then. From any consideration, this was an outright wrong decision to waste time over this project, and I informed Mr. Gadgil accordingly.

Surprisingly, things did not end here. In one of our meetings later, Mr. Gadgil kept on pursuing me to manufacture a suitable apparatus for this experiment, as colleges kept on pressurizing him to help them out. Finally, I gave in. I told Mr. Gadgil that I would try to manufacture a suitable apparatus, if he was ready to invest some amount and give me an initial order for at least 15 Nos at a price to be negotiated later.

Rather reluctantly, I started giving some thoughts to project. To start with there were two problems. Firstly, I had to find the original article where this experiment was explained. The second difficulty was about the magic eye tube. Since we had an old Westinghouse radio in the house that incorporated this tube, I knew at least how it looks. By 1970’s, even though valve radio sets were still common, transistor radio sets were available in market and were getting popular. The valve radios available in market still used these magic eye tubes as tuning indicators, but they were of different types. In this type, two green strips would be seen moving towards or away from each other. When a station was tuned, the green strips would move towards each other or even meet. This tube was called type EM80 and it was of original PHILIPS design but  made in India by Bharat Electronics Ltd. . Availability of this tube was of no use to me as what I needed was a valve with round display at top. This display was in form of a segment of a green donut or a butterfly like ring and when a station was tuned, the  ends of the green butterfly wings would appear to close and would form a donut like green ring.  Such valves were used earlier in 1940’s and 1950’s and were made by American companies like RCA with type numbers such as 6E5 or 6U5. These magic eye indicators were no longer being used in Radio sets in India.

(Type EM 80 Magic eye tuning indicator, available but not useful)

{Image source By Gvogia - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22609210}

( RCA 6E5 magic eye tuning indicator, what was required)

{Image source By Poc, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12456463}

During my next trip to Mumbai I went around Lamington Road Electronic markets, looking for 6E5 or 6U5 tubes. RCA tubes were difficult to get; it was possible to get some other east European make at reasonable cost. This was positive news for me.  Yet the main obstacle was still to be overcome.  Details of this experiment for which an apparatus was to be built were still unknown. Despite my best effort, I was unable to find any reference to this experiment in any book or journal in two well-known Libraries in Pune, those of Poona University and College of Engineering. Finally, I contacted Mr. Gadgil again and told him to go and meet Professor of Physics at the University of Bombay and try to find out any information, if available with him.

Mr. Gadgil met the concerned professor in the university, which had now shifted to ‘Kalina’ near Santa Cruz suburb of Mumbai and managed to get reference to an article in some publication about this experiment. Once I had this information, I soon managed to get a photocopy of this article. However, I do not now remember this article or where it was published.  While writing this blogpost I made extensive search on net but did not produce any positive result. Surprisingly I found that this experiment is now described in number of articles published in last 10/15 years and there are even a few You Tube videos made on it. Yet the original article is not mentioned or referred to anywhere and is unfortunately lost forever.

With this information in hand, I started to make a prototype and soon succeeded.  In about two weeks’ time, our finished apparatus was ready. Without going into any theory or practicalities I can describe the apparatus here (See the image also) in this way. It consisted of a sheet metal box painted in nice ivory colour  which housed several power supplies.  A coil of copper wire wound on a bobbin was fixed on top of the box. A standard octal valve socket was also fitted on the box so that the magic eye tube could be fitted inside the core tube of the bobbin. Screw type terminals were provided for connecting voltmeters and ammeters. A potentiometer control was provided for adjusting grid volage.  A mains power on off switch and a power indicator also were provided.  A measurement template also was made, which could be placed on top of the coil.

Having finished the apparatus, I sent it to Mumbai for practical demonstrations in various colleges. Within a month Mr. Gadgil happily confirmed that the demonstration went well and value of e/m measured by colleges with my apparatus came right always quite accurately. A few colleges had already placed orders, and we should start manufacturing as soon as possible.

I was happy with the result, yet businessman in me was not particularly enthused as the order quantity and the price realized were quite low. Yet I resigned myself to the thought that the work was sort of promotion for us, like giving diaries or Diwali gifts. Soon the order was completed and matter closed. We never made this product again.

I could, however, never understood, Bombay University’s logic in introducing this experiment in curriculum without ensuring that the key component to make the experiment apparatus is available and was no longer manufactured.

10^th December 2025

 

Pune: Linking the British Empire

  

On one fine day sometime in 1950’s, my father asked me whether I was interested in accompanying him, for a visit to a radio station near Daund town, about 40 Km from Pune city located on Pune Solapur Road. I was just a school going lad and had never heard before about any radio stations or any associated stuff. We had an old Westinghouse Radio receiver in the house.  This radio was mainly used to listen to news and occasionally music programmes. Pune had no radio station, and we only could listen to Mumbai A and B stations. However, since this trip would mean a long ride on the motorcycle, I immediately said yes! And we were off on Solapur Road on the AJS 350 motorcycle belonging to my father. 

About an hour later, we reached a medium sized single-story building somewhere near Daund town.  Apparently, my father knew the engineer in charge. He welcomed us and took us to a large hall in which number of large black-coloured cages could be seen.  In each of these cages there were several radio receivers with many more controlling dials than our old Westinghouse radio at home had.  The engineer told us that these cages are called Faraday cages and used so that radio receivers only receive signals from antenna and not spurious ones.   Some of the receivers were connected to paper punches punching holes on paper tape rolls fixed on sides. Some of the other receivers had only outgoing cables. The engineer explained that the receivers with paper tape rolls are receiving international radio telegraphic messages or wires (तार) and were being recorded in the punched tape form. Later these spools would be run on the regular P&T telegraph machines connected by telephone wires to Mumbai, and all messages or wires would be forwarded to Mumbai for further distribution. The other receivers were receiving only downlink conversations of international telephone calls, and these were directly being forwarded to Mumbai. To demonstrate this, he just plugged headphones in one of the jacks on receivers and we could clearly hear only a humming sound. The conversations obviously were being demodulated in Mumbai and us at receiving station had no idea who was speaking with whom.

All receivers were connected by cables to antennas erected at the outside.  There were tall seventy- or eighty-feet high steel towers standing with wires connected in between them and receiver cables received signals from there.

The engineer also told us another interesting byte. He said that Daund receiving station is only connected through a place in Britain and then to London. All international wires or calls are routed through London. This would mean that even after independence, we were still part of empire network.   

For a school going lad like me, this visit turned out to be an eye opener and probably began my fascination for Electronics. Something I still carry even after seventy long years.  I was curious and asked the Engineer uncle, that I have understood what you do here but do not see any outgoing cables or calls. He laughed and told me that to see that I would have to visit Beam wireless station at Dighi, again near Pune, on some other day.

Not much later, I had an opportunity to visit Dighi beam wireless station also, along with my father. They wanted some RF meters and wanted to discuss that.  Trip to Dighi turned out to be much shorter as it was not very far on Pune Alandi Road. In Dighi, the transmitter was set up in a similar building but with a very high ceiling. The transmitter was in two parts in adjoining rooms. One room had large vacuum tubes in glass shell with filaments that looked red hot. These vacuum tubes were connected to actual transmitter sets, kept in the other adjoining room. Here punched paper tape spools turned and fed data to transmitters at a very high speed. There were also some transmitters by which  uplink conversations of international telephone calls were transmitted. I saw that most of the equipment here was that of Marconi make. The transmitting tubes were connected to a cable which ran outside. Two towers stood outside again 70 to 80 feet high. A dipole type transmitting antenna was connected between the towers. The cable from transmitting tubes was connected at the center of the antenna wire.

Though I have very faint recollections of what I saw at Daund and Dighi, both these visits made a profound impact on me and were one of the reasons why I chose Electronics as a career. However, I realized much later that these two places must have been very important links in communication network of the British Empire in those years and had continued to be the most critical places through which  first British India and then independent India, communicated with the world. Their dominance came to an end only when satellite communication dish antenna came up at Arvi near Narayangaon on Pune-Nashik Road sometime in late 1960’s.

After the visits, I had many questions in my mind. Though I could find answers to most of these only after I trained myself as an electrical communication engineer. After that my respect for engineers like Marconi of early twentieth century, increased manyfold. With limited knowledge and resources, they had created wonders without any doubt.  Luckily now, a lot of material about beam wireless concepts and stations such as Daund and Dighi has become available on the net. It is therefore certainly worthwhile to go through history of these places.

The idea of sending morse code signals by radio waves is not new. Yet all the efforts to send these signals over long ranges proved unreliable with many problems such as fading being faced. Only around 1920, Scientists had realized the possibility of sending such signals by using short wave carrier frequencies.  By 1930 the famous scientist Guglielmo Marconi had built and was offering a point-to-point shortwave radiotelegraphy system for commercial use.  Marconi also developed the concept of the Beam Wireless system.  In this, radio frequency energy at shortwaves was concentrated into a narrow path, using a complex system of antenna arrays. The first Beam transmitter in the world was built at Bodmin, Moor, Cornwall, England, and the first beam receiver at Bridgewater, Somerset, England.

The British Government of that time immediately realized the tremendous advantage of Marconi system as it would now be possible for them to connect to all the dominions of the empire on 24 X 7 basis. First to come up were links to American continent. The first beam stations on the American land were at Drummondville and Yamachiohe, Canada, being replicas of the English facilities. Soon links were also established to Australia and South Africa.

The fourth Beam Wireless Station was constructed in India, with the transmitter station located at Dighi near Pune (Poona of those days), and the receiver station some distance away at Daund. The link stations in England for communicating to these facilities were set up at Grimsby & Winthorpe. The Marconi Beam Wireless Station in India was officially opened by Lord Irwin, and the first message from India to England was a greeting of loyalty to His Majesty King George 5. There were two transmitters at this station, both rated at 10 kW, and they were on the air under the call signs VWY & VWZ. This is interesting because concept of linking together a transmitting station using a particular carrier frequency and its call sign are used even today.

One of the questions many people ask is about setting up two separate stations for transmitting and receiving that are physically apart from as much as 30 to 40 Km. There is a simple explanation. Both these stations used different carrier frequencies and interference of transmitting signal in received signal was quite possible as effective filtering was not available in those days. To avoid this both these stations were set up physically apart.  Interestingly these two frequencies, known as Uplink and Downlink frequencies, are used even today in all communication systems. For example, my mobile phone uses frequencies such as 2136.5 Mhz for Downlink and1946.5 Mhz for Uplink.  We must appreciate the simple solution used by Marconi in those days to keep interference down at minimum possible levels.

We can also have an idea of the equipment that was used at Dighi and Daund stations in those days.  At Daund, the receivers were probably Marconi Type R.C.25 Short Wave Receivers and the antennas most probably of Rhombic type.  At Dighi, most probably Marconi High Frequency telegraphy/telephony Transmitter Type SWB8E, or its earlier version, was in use.  The antenna must have been a dipole array.

In World War II years, there were rapid developments in radio communication engineering.  In addition to carrier telegraphy that was in use since 1927, Dighi and Daund stations were upgraded and received new equipment for Carrier frequency based duplex radio telephony and it became possible to route telephone calls from all over India to the world from them. These two stations sent out and received radiograms, cable-gams and photo-telegrams and linked up India with the United Kingdom, the United States of America, China, Australia, Japan, Indonesia and Thailand. They also maintained an internal service between Mumbai and New Delhi. The Central Office at Mumbai served as a transit link.

The specific types of transmitters in use in the 1950s must have been advanced for their time, utilizing vacuum tube technology for amplitude modulation (AM) radiotelephony and radioteletype networks, far evolved from the original spark-gap technology. 

In the 1950s, the primary shortwave (SW) receivers were vacuum tube-based models.  RCA AR 88 was a very popular receiver, and I might have seen these at Daund.  Some old equipment was probably still in use, but since no official record exists, it is difficult to say anything.  I feel that what I saw at Daund and Dighi must have been this newer equipment.

Both Dighi and Daund stations lost their relevance and importance when satellite communication dish antenna came up at Arvi near Narayangaon on Pune-Nashik Road sometime in late 1960’s. The antenna was linked to the Intelsat satellite. Since very effective filtering techniques had been developed by now, there was no interference of uplink signal on downlink signals and no need to have transmitters and receivers located with large physical distance like Dighi and Daund.  International communications were also delinked from Posts and Telegraphs Department and a separate company known as Videsh Sanchar Nigam was incorporated and handed over this charge. This company was later sold to TATA group and privatized.

Even Arvi station, also part of TATA company, slowly lost its importance as India started launching its own satellites and new dish antennas came up at Bengaluru and Ahmadabad. Arvi dish probably is still functional, but I could not find any information about its present role.

With these new developments, Pune lost all its importance as a crucial linking station between India and the world. The land around Dighi station now probably belongs to a private company, TATA Communications. About Daund station, no trace remains.   All that remains now are the memories of these stations as no Government or private authority ever thought of setting up a small museum that could house the old equipment   and display charts to indicate how they functioned. 

10 November 2025

 ( Some of the images may be copyrighted. However I could not find who holds it. Do not use for commercial purposes)

MTR or Mavalli Tiffin Rooms of Bengaluru

 

A trip to MTR, located just next to Lalbagh, is mandatory if you are visiting Bengaluru. For a new comer, the place, which looks like a small 3 story residential dwelling, can be very confusing.

When you enter, you see a guy sitting behind a small table, number of dhoti clad men loitering around, a small staircase leading upwards and a strong pervading smell of sambhar. If you insist, you can prepay here for your tea or coffee but nothing else. Any further question, you are directed to staircase.

What you see upstairs is a medium sized room fitted with wooden benches and lots of people waiting. Room is adorned with old photographs. The room appears more like the waiting room of a medical practitioner than a restarunt. On the side there is a guy sitting next to a half closed sliding door with a writing pad. He asks for your name and points out to one of the wooden benches.

You sit and wait. Minutes tick by. Nothing happens. After a long wait of 20 odd minutes, the sliding door opens and a group of people trickles out. After some time the door keeper announces names of people, who can go in. If you are lucky you get in, otherwise have to wait for the next lot.

Finally you get into another room with old wooden tables and chairs. Dhoti clad waiters rush about and take orders. You order what you want and wait again.

After a while, food arrives. The first bite itself would tell you that why the wait was worth it. Dosas are fab. Never eaten that good a Dosa. Even tea and coffee are good. I get my favourite black filter coffee.

Waiters are very friendly. He tells me that the place is 98 years old. He brings the bill. Surprisingly amount is very modest.

As you walk out you are filled with satisfaction and happyness. That is all what MTR is about.