Desi Tubelight

Tubelight has been part of our lives since 1940 and not only ruled our homes before the 90s, but it was an acceptable term in our language to define slow processing. (Sallu Bhai even made a movie). While the incandescent bulb was Rs10, the Tubelight commanded a 10X price with much longer life. The white underline was the signature of progress and even affluence.

As a child, I was fascinated by the concept of the Tubelight. It had a metal strip base and a pair of folding plastic holders at each end. One had to adjust the slots before carefully inserting the twin pins at each end of a glass tube. As trouble-shooting, we would rotate the tube back and forth till it stopped flickering and happy bright again. The ballast, which we called "Choke", was an essential black box or reactor of the Tubelight, along with a round cylinder called "Starter".

The base of the tube light was home to lizards, and watching how it would catch insects (free Nat Geo Channel those days) was scary. Finally, when the flickering old tube light reached the end of its life (it used to turn black at the ends), it became a desi lightsaber and breaking it (when parents left for the office) would create 'Phat' sound as Argon gas would discharge.

The LED introduction in 2000 slowly led to the transformation of tube lights from complex ecosystems to simple tubes. However, the tube light design has not changed much since 1940. It was fascinating and challenging when Havells invited us to change the status quo. We not only created new age wall sculptures but also elegantly captured user aspiration on having mood lighting along with functional lighting of the tube light.

A true Desi In a Design project, and so happy we were part of this lightbulb moment of Tubelight.

Thank you, team Havells!