‘So to Speak’ with Dhiyanesh Ravichandran
Nothing quite matches the versatility and flexibility of backhoe loaders in construction entrepreneurship.
The other day when I was babysitting my 7-year-old nephew, he was watching an animated series called ‘Bob the Builder’, in which the protagonist is a building contractor of some kind hanging out with construction vehicles and trucks. The show caught my attention instantaneously, partly because I love machines, but mainly because its theme is related to my motoring journalism, an excuse to banish away any guilt arising out of watching cartoon with a 7-year-old!
A plethora of characters embellish the episodic plot in which Bob and his team take up construction, renovation and civil repair assignments. Whenever some crisis arises, their resolvability, collaborative and socialization skills are emphasized, could be a major takeaway for young kids of this era. One character that bemused me the most was ‘Scoop’ – a yellow backhoe loader whose resemblance to our real world JCB 3CX is uncanny and intentional. But that’s not all. The way this character has been imagined is simply brilliant, quite meticulously portraying what this machine stands for in reality. Let me tell you how.
It is said that Scoop was the first machine character written by Keith Chapman, the series’ original creator. It is also one of the few characters in the series to closely resemble a real-life equipment. When Bob became a builder, the Scoop was the first machine ever acquired, and an undisputed leader of Bob’s machine team. All through the series, Scoop appears youthful and overly-enthusiastic, remains best at everything he does. More often, his progressive ideas may cause confusion for the team Bob, but with a little help, Scoop can always find a way to dig himself out!
There’s no denying that the backhoe loaders are celebrated workhorses in the construction world, an irreplaceable piece of equipment for contractors across the globe. Ever since its inception in mid-20th century, this particular machine’s broader design and way of doing things stood the test of times, in spite of the advent of multiple alternatives. Although the idea of developing a dig-and-load combo machine took shape around 1948 parallelly in the US and the UK, it was JCB that pioneered in a dedicated backhoe loader, with buckets permanently attached to a robust chassis. Later, in 1981, this very marque introduced the novel machine in India as well.
JCB’s long prominence with backhoes resulted in a genericized trademark – all such digger machines are typically called as “JCBs” that the technically right term ‘backhoe’ is hardly known to the operators and general folks – not just in India, but even in the UK and Ireland! Even the telecom industry has coined a term ‘JCB Fade’ to refer to any accidental damage or complete severing of a communications cable by construction activities.
It is indeed the unmatchable abilities of the backhoe that makes it an ace. It combines the two basic functions of earthmoving seamlessly and efficiency, offers superior manoeuvrability and mobility on or off road, supports a host of attachments for a variety of applications, all the while being one of the most affordable equipment in the market. Any critical job in construction and material handling, you name it, the machine’s flexibility will aide you to meet the ends.
But what matters more to me is the human-centered aspect of its story. In India, particularly in semi-towns and rural areas, the backhoe facilitates its very own wage-earning operators to become entrepreneurs. Since the productivity of these machines are high and are in demand, banks find no difficulty in extending “JCB loans” to folks, as the chances of backhoe operators defaulting is very rare. In some regions like western Tamil Nadu, such independent operators have proliferated, resulting in heavy demand for drivers / operators, their fares and working hours have bettered as well.
Back to the series, the Scoop’s popular catchphrases are “Can we fix it?” and “No prob, Bob!”. Its association and partnership with Bob the builder would appear as perfect and quite complementary, something that I notice between backhoes and their operators in India without any exaggeration.