The Government of India asked for recommendations on a programme of training in design that would serve as an aid to the small industries; and that would resist the present rapid deterioration in design and quality of consumer goods. Charles Eames, American industrial designer and his wife and colleague Ray Eames, visited India for three months at the invitation of the Government, with the sponsorship of the Ford Foundation, to explore the problems of design and to make recommendations for a training programme. The Eameses toured throughout India, making a careful study of the many centres of design, handicrafts and general manufacture.

They talked with many persons, official and non-official, in the field of small and large industry, in design and architecture, and in education.

As a result of their study and discussions, the following report emerged.

Foreword
You have the right to work but for the work's sake only;
You have no right to the fruits of work.
Desire for the fruits of work must never be your motive in working.
Never give way to laziness, either.
Perform every action with your heart fixed on the Supreme Lord.
Renounce attachment to the fruits.
Be even-tempered in success and failures, for it is this evenness of
temper which is meant by Yoga.
Work done with anxiety about results is far inferior to work done
without such anxiety, in the calm of self-surrender.
Seek refuge in the knowledge of Brahman.
They who work selfishly for results are miserable.

Bhagavad Gita

Part - I
We have been asked by the Government of India to recommend a program of training in the area of design which would serve as an aid to the small industries. We have been asked to state what India can do to resist the rapid deterioration of consumer goods within the country today.

In the light of the dramatic acceleration with which change is taking place in India and the seriousness of the basic problems involved, we recommend that without delay there be a sober investigation into those values and those qualities that Indians hold important to a good life, that there be a close scrutiny of those elements that go to make up a “Standard of Living”.

We recommend that those who make this investigation be prepared to follow it with a restudy of the problems of environment and shelter, to look upon the detailed problems of services and objects as though they were being attacked for the first time; to restate solutions to these problems in theory and in actual prototype; to explore the evolving symbols of India.

One suspects that much benefit would be gained from starting this search at the small village level.In order to insure the validity of such investigation and such restatement, it will be necessary to bring together and bring to bear on the question – all the disciplines that have developed in our time – sociology, engineering, philosophy, architecture, economics, communications, physics, psychology, history, painting, anthropology... anything to restate the questions of familiar problems in a fresh clear way.

The growing speed of production and training cries out for some sober unit of informed concern sufficiently insulated to act as a steering device in terms of direction, quality and ultimate values.

We recommend a Board of Governors drawn from the broad field of disciplines mentioned above – these must be receptive, involvable people concerned with the future of India and the image she presents to herself and to the world.

We will describe in some detail the functions and organisation of this proposed institute – the faculty, the trainees, the proposed projects, service aspects and the physical plant. First we will give a general background of this concept – some form of which must be developed – as an immediate and practical necessity. The reason for this urgency is quite apparent. The change India is undergoing is a change in kind not a change of degree. The medium that is producing this change is communication; not some influence of the West on the East. The phenomenon of communication is something that affects a world not a country.

The advanced complexities of communication were perhaps felt first in Europe, then West to America which was a fertile traditionless field. They then moved East and West gathering momentum and striking India with terrific impact – an impact that was made more violent because of India's own complex of isolation, barriers of language, deep-rooted tradition.

The decisions that are made in a tradition-oriented society are apt to be unconscious decisions – in that each situation or action automatically calls for a specified reaction. Behaviour patterns are pre-programmed, pre-set.

The nature of a communication-oriented society is different by kind – not by degree.

All decisions must be conscious decisions evaluating changing factors. In order to even approach the quality and values of a traditional society, a conscious effort must be made to relate every factor that might possibly have an effect.

Security here lies in change and conscious selection and correction in relation to evolving needs. India stands to face the change with three great
advantages :

First: She has a tradition and a philosophy familiar with the meaning of creative destruction.

Second: She need not make all the mistakes others have made in the transition.

Third: Her immediate problems are well defined : FOOD, SHELTER, DISTRIBUTION, POPULATION.

This last stated advantage is a great one. Such ever-present statements of need should block or counteract any self-conscious urge to be original. They should put consciousness of quality – selection of first things first – (investigation into what are the first things) on the basis of survival not caprice.

Of all the objects we have seen and admired during our visit to India, the Lota, that simple vessel of everyday use, stands out as perhaps the greatest, the most beautiful. The village women have a process which, with the use of tamarind and ash, each day turns this brass into gold. But how would one go about designing a Lota? First one would have to shut out all preconceived ideas on the subject and then begin to consider factor after factor :

The optimum amount of liquid to be fetched, carried, poured and stored in a prescribed set of circumstances.

• The size and strength and gender of the hands (if hands) that would manipulate it.
• The way it is to be transported – head, hip, hand, basket or cart.
• The balance, the center of gravity, when empty, when full, its balance when rotated for pouring.
• The fluid dynamics of the problem not only when pouring but when filling and cleaning, and under the complicated motions of head carrying – slow and fast.
• Its sculpture as it fits the palm of the hand, the curve of the hip.
• Its sculpture as compliment to the rhythmic motion of walking or a static post at the well.
• The relation of opening to volume in terms of storage uses – and objects other than liquid.
• The size of the opening and inner contour in terms of cleaning.
• The texture inside and out in terms of cleaning and feeling.
• Heat transfer – can it be grasped if the liquid is hot ?
• How pleasant does it feel, eyes closed, eyes open ?
• How pleasant does it sound, when it strikes another vessel, is set down on ground or stone, empty or full – or being poured into?
• What is the possible material ?
• What is its cost in terms of working ?
• What is its cost in terms of ultimate service ?
• What kind of an investment does the material provide as product, as salvage ?
• How will the material affect the contents, etc., etc. ?
• How will it look as the sun reflects off its surface ?
• How does it feel to possess it, to sell it, to give it ?

The simplest problem of environment has a list of aspects that makes the list we have given for the Lota small by comparison. The roster of disciplines we have suggested can bring about measurable answers to some measurable aspects of the problem, but in addition they must provide the trainee with a questioning approach and a smell for appropriateness; a concern for quality which will help him through the immeasurable relationships.

In the face of the inevitable destruction of many cultural values – in the face of the immediate need for the nation to feed and shelter itself – a drive for quality takes on a real meaning. It is not a self- conscious effort to develop an aesthetic – it is a relentless search for quality that must be maintained if this new Republic is to survive.

Part-II

The Institute
The objective has been stated in Part I. It may be restated as a desire to create an alert and impatient national conscience – a onscience concerned with the quality and ultimate values of the environment.

The size should be small starting with perhaps a dozen students – but with a faculty that would more than complement them in number. Even as it grew to optimum size, this one to one ratio of faculty to students might well be maintained.

The effectiveness of the institute will depend on the way in which results are communicated Effectiveness will vary as the square of the calibre of staff it attracts – and as the cube of the degree to which the staff and students become personally involved. Having stated the objectives (in Part I) we will treat specific aspects of the institute in the following order : First - The Students or Trainees Because if we know the objectives we may do well to look around for the available raw material. Second - The Faculty or Staff Because if we know the objectives and have the raw material we can select the appropriate tools. Third - The Projects or Methods With objectives, raw material and tools we can begin to plan the operation. Refinement of operation will of course call for refining the selection of tools. Fourth - Aspects of Service Method of channelling results of the operation so as to affect the original objectives. Fifth - The Physical Plant Housing and equipping the entire process.

1 The Trainees or Students
The purpose of training these students is to prepare them to meet problems in design, problems which have occurred many times, and problems which have never occurred before – and to meet them all openly and inquiringly. Strictly speaking, preparation for problems that have never been solved before calls for education, not training. So we must look for prospective trainees who are highly educable and who have some background in the complex areas of environment and communications.

There appears to be, at the present time, only one main group of students who have been exposed to the variety of training and discipline that might prepare them for such work – these are graduate architects . (Immediate note of warning) : Graduate architects are recommended not because of their design training but in spite of it. With some few but encouraging exceptions – the architectural student's designs are an assemblage of inappropriate cliches. The students themselves seem much brighter than their designs – the disciplines of Physics and Chemistry are not unknown to them. They have in their training applied these disciplines to some sociological and human scale problems. They are aware of the use of materials and some of the functions of economics and they are apt to suspect that these have something to do with the history and development of a culture.

As a group, young architects are apt to be involvable in general social problems and in theatre, dance, music and other aspects of communications. They tend to have a higher than average potential for enthusiasm. This is important because if they are enthusiastic enough they might discover some of the values that exist in the commonplace things that surround them. There are some good clues in the everyday solutions to unspectacular problems, in vernacular expressions that are so often ignored.

This description if carefully applied would be enough to screen the prospects. Naturally they need not all be architects – an equally responsible young engineer, economist, doctor, mathematician, philosopher or housewife might also be a candidate. These students become part of a graduate school with a training period of perhaps two years. According to the development of the particular student, several things may then happen:

          He may continue working in the service branch of the institute.
          He may be grabbed off by private industry;
          He may be invited to join some other branch of government service;
          He may open a consulting office of his own;
          He may return to architecture as a much needed, enriched version of
              an architect.

We would hope that those leaving the institute would leave with a start towards a real education. They should be trained not only to solve problems – but what is more important, they should be trained to help others solve their own problems. One of the most valuable functions of a good industrial designer today is to ask the right questions of those concerned so that they become freshly involved and seek a solution themselves.