Our computer is our head ....

"Our computer is our head and our Gandhi cap is the cover to protect it from the sun or rain". In an age where people cannot even imagine living without a computer, I was amused on reading this comment by Raghunath D. Medge on the Indian Express. I am sure your first reaction would be "Who is that ???" He is the president of the Nutan Mumbai Tiffin Box Supply Charity Trust. And why is that so famous ? Because they were awarded the Six Sigma award by Forbes magazine. Add to this that a group of students from Harvard Business School did a study about how they maintain such excellent quality assurance standards and that Prince Charles, on his visit to India, paid a special visit to them (They didn’t delay your operations during his visit though) . To think that a group of (mostly) illiterate set of people could achieve such a great distinction is mind boggling !

Mumbaikars have a unique way of having lunch at their office. Normally, you would expect them to carry their lunch when they leave for office/school/college, as in any other city. But no, they are so adamant about having their lunch freshly cooked that they get it delivered through a unique system (food courier, shall I say ?). I am not talking about a few hundreds, but approximately about 170,000 mumbaikars !!

To explain the system in a few words, about 5000 odd dabbawallahs collect dabbas (tiffin carriers) from suburban households all around Mumbai. They are taken to the nearest suburban railway station and sorted based on the destination. Another person takes over from here and delivers it to a bigger station and again sorted. After changing about 3-4 hands, the dabba is finally delivered to the desired destination. A complex coding system of colours, dashes, crosses and dots identify the street, building and even the floor of the destination ! The entire system depends heavily on excellent teamwork and timing, apart from the Mumbai suburban railway system (another Mumbai marvel, more on it later).

One might expect utter chaos and confusion, considering the numbers and the distance covered. Surprisingly, they have a complaint rate of just 1 in about 6 lakh ! That is a Six Sigma value of 6.15. The Six Sigma standard states that to achieve Six Sigma status, a process must not produce more than 3.4 defects per million opportunities (which would correspond to a Six Sigma value of 6). I guess their quality metrics must be the envy of many MNC's.

Some interesting information :

1. Most of the dabbawallahs are related to each other or belong to the same villages (adjoining Pune).
2. All of them are shareholders of the Nutan Mumbai Tiffin Box Supply Charity Trust !
3. They have their own unique Panchayat system to handle complaints/misconduct.
4. The monthly charges are about Rs. 200-300 per month.

That is some food for thought for each and everyone of us. Something which every Mumbaikar (or any Indian for that matter) should be proud of.