Technologies for the Base of the Economic Pyramid

Dr. Suraj Bhat is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechatronics at Mangalore Institute of Technology and Engineering. He obtained his PhD from the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi. His thesis was on the selection and analysis of technologies developed for the base of the economic pyramid. He was also associated with the Rural Technology Action Group (RuTAG), IIT Delhi, where he was involved in several socio-technical projects. His research interests include design for development, decision making, design optimization, and appropriate technology. He has several publications, including journal articles and proceedings in national and international conferences.

Prof. (Dr.) Vinay Gupta is a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the IEC College of Engineering and Technology, and currently serves as the director of the institute. He earned his Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi in "Dynamic Model Based Optimum Design of Robotic Systems" from the Mechanical Engineering Department. He has more than two decades of teaching and research experience. He has led several projects as Principal Investigator in collaboration with the Rural Technology Action Group (RuTAG) at IIT Delhi. Prof. Gupta co-supervised a Ph.D. candidate at IIT Delhi, focusing on technology selection, analysis and design for rural and economically weaker sections. He is the co-author of the book titled "Dynamics and Balancing of Multibody Systems: Applications to Rural and Robotic Systems," published by Springer Nature in 2025. His research interests include multibody dynamics, mechanisms, optimum design, and robotics.

Prof. Subir Kumar Saha is a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi since 1996 and currently serves as the Project Director of the I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics at IIT Delhi (since 2020). He holds a B.E. in Mechanical Engineering from RE College (now NIT), Durgapur (1983), M.Tech. from IIT Kharagpur, and a Ph.D. from McGill University, Canada (1991). Previously, he worked as a Research Scientist at Toshiba Corporation's R&D Center in Japan (1991-1995) and has been a visiting faculty at IIT Madras, McGill University (Canada), Monash University (Australia), and the University of Verona (Italy). His accolades include the Humboldt Fellowship (1999) by the AvH Foundation, Germany, the Distinguished Alumnus Award from NIT Durgapur (2020), and recognition by his high-school alma mater Midnapore College (2024). Prof. Saha's research interests focus on robotics, multibody dynamics, rural technology applications, and innovative teaching and research methodologies. He established the Mechatronics Laboratory at IIT Delhi in 2001 and contributed to establish the Programme for Autonomous Robotics (PAR) Laboratory in 2010. He has authored textbook, several specialized books, peer reviewed journal and conference publications and completed many national and international-level sponsored projects and consultancies.