AddressVill: Jopul, Patil Baba,Tal: Dindori,Dist.:Nashik,Maharashtra

Scouted byNorth MaharastraUniversity

Genesis Ramdas belongs to NasikDistrict (Maharashtra), which is a majorcentre of grape production. A few yearsago, some farmers approached him witha request to develop a machine toseparate stalks from dry grapes and alsograde them into different quality raisins.Till then, this was mostly done manually.

Grading of raisins involves sorting raisinsby size, mainly for exports. To produceraisins, bunches of grape are first broughtfrom the vineyards to the raisin-manufacturing sheds. There, they areprocessed according to the variety ofraisins to be manufactured. Two of themain grades are the green coloured raisinHirwa and yellow coloured raisin Pivla. TheHirwa grade is mainly made for exportand Pivla is for sale in the domesticmarket.

These raisins need further processing –cleaning, removal of debris and gradinginto various sizes. Conventionally, thiswas done manually by women who workedfor minimum wages. The grading was doneby them based on visual inspection. Tofind a solution, Ramdas spent two years

Grading machine for raisins5

FARM MACHINERY-AGRI PROCESSING NATIONAL SECOND

Ramdas Madhavrao Jagtap (51) belongs to Jopul village, Nashik, Maharashtra. His

father was a carpenter, but Ramdas was not interested in carpentry, so he set up his own welding

workshop in 1969-1970. He makes farm machinery, bullock carts and other such equipment.

Though educated only up to the eleventh standard, he ensured that his sons had the opportunity to

pursue higher studies. His eldest son has completed his post graduation in Inorganic Chemistry

and works as a school teacher. Two other sons are engineers in the Chemical and Mechanical

disciplines. The youngest son is studying computer engineering.

using the principle of the thresher forgrading but this didn’t work. The mainreason was that there is a markeddifference in the weight of the grain andthe debris compared to the difference inweight of the raisins and the debris, whichis much less. With his knowledge andexperience, he developed a machine in1993 that would cater to the grapefarmers’ requirements.

However, there were a number ofshortcomings that took time to berectified. One problem with the firstdesign was that because of excessivebeating in the machine, the sugar wouldsecrete out when the raisins were kept incold storage and thus the sugar contentwas reduced. This spoiled the quality ofthe raisins. Ramdas made a few changesand within a year came up with a modifieddesign. Another problem he faced wasthat the blower was picking raisins alongwith the debris. So he reduced thediameter of the impeller and thus reducedthe intensity of the vacuum. The raisinswere now not picked along with the debris.Gradually, the grape farmers got to knowof this machine. After studying it, they

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realized that this machine was easy to use and veryefficient and began placing orderswith him.

The InnovationThis is a single unit that removes dust and twigs andgrades raisins by size. The machine consists of threemotors and three sieves, blower, a belt and pulleymechanism and a rubber brush.

The grapes are dried for 15 – 20 days and then treatedwith chemicals to ensure proper drying and protectionfrom pests. The dried grapes are fed into the machine

through a feeder, which has a rotor with a rubber brush.A 3 HP motor drives the mechanism. The brushhammers the dried grapes to get the small twigs offthe grapes. These dried grapes are then passed throughthe blower, which blows the dust off them and cleansthe grapes with the help of a high-pressure airflow.The blower utilizes the power of a 2 HP motor. The driedgrapes are now cleaned and are graded with a vibratorconnected to three sieves. The dried grapes separatedover each sieve are collected in a different chamberafter they are scaled in specific grades. These are thenfinally processed for making raisins (kishmish). Themachine grades the raisins into three sizes – large,medium and small.

There are two models of the machine- the smaller modelgrades about two tons of raisins in 12 hours and thebigger one grades four tons in the same period. Themachines weigh 600 kg and 1000 kg respectively. Thesmaller machine costs Rs.30,000 and the bigger oneRs.45,000.

AdvantagesThis machine saves time by blowing away the dust,removing the twigs and grading the raisins by size.This simplifies the entire process for the farmer andafter the raisins are graded, the farmer visually inspectsthe quality. With this device, the operator is safe fromexposure to the dust from the blower. This machinehelps in removing the tediousness involved in manuallycleaning every single raisin and grading it accordingly.

The other comparable machine is imported and costsaround Rs.20,00,000. It grades grapes according totheir colour, size, shape etc. The cost advantage isoverwhelming in the case of Jagtap’s unit - it costs onlyabout Rs.45,000 and gives satisfactory results comparedto the imported machine. This could become animportant factor in users’ choice of equipment in future.

Current StatusRamdas Jagtap has been working on this machine formore than a decade and has been selling it to localgrape farmers in the Satara, Sangli and Sholapur regions

16 Ramdas Madhavrao Jagtap Grading machine for raisins

of Maharashtra as well as in Bijapur, Karnataka. Oneunit has also been installed at the manufacturing unitof ‘Rangoli’ raisins, one of the biggest raisin exportersof the region. So far, Ramdas has sold 25-30 smallunits and 40-50 big units. These machines have highdiffusion potential in all major grape growing regions.Many prominent grape farmers of the area have boughtthis grading machine from him.

Generally, farmers make some of the payment inadvance when they order the machine and the balanceis paid when the machine is ready. Ramdas hasemployed a couple of labourers. He hires more whenhe has sufficient orders. He manufactures the machinesduring November to January and sells them duringFebruary to April as the demand is seasonal.

This machine can also be adapted for grading mangoesfor making pickles and other fruits. Ramdas was notkeen to patent the machine as similar machines werealready available in the market. Following Ramdas’innovation, three other fabricators have copied thedesign and are now supplying them to the major grapegrowing regions of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh andTamil Nadu. However these manufacturers have alsorecognized the fact that the original machine wasdeveloped by Jagtap. His machine also incorporatesadditional features which farmers find useful. Once sold

a machine cannot be patented as the technology issupposed to have come in public domain.

Other contributions to the grape industry andlaurels earned

Ramdas has also developed a machine that washesthe dry grapes. Apart from this he has fabricated aconveyor belt for a grape packaging factory thatfacilitates the movement of grapes from the primaryhouse to the packing hall for the purpose of export.This is very useful for grape exporters as the area forpackaging is generally very small. By using this belt, alarge number of boxes can be packed quickly and thelabour charges are reduced. This has prompted severalgrape exporters to have the conveyor belt installed.

Jagtap was honoured by the National Research Centrefor Grapes (Indian Council of Agricultural Research)for his contribution to grape production/ processing/marketing on December 23, 2002, on the occasion of‘Kisan Diwas’ organized to mark the birth centenary ofLal Bahadur Shastri, former Prime Minister of India.Maharashtra Grape Growers’ Association, Pune, hasalso recognized his valuable contribution to grapeprocessing in Maharashtra. Jagtap has also receivedawards from the local communities for his innovation.

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