Saiyid Muhammad Hadi: Difference between revisions

'''Saiyid Muhammad Hadi''' (4 September 1863, [[Hasanpur]], [[Awadh]]<ref name=":0">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/indianbiographic00raoc/page/172/mode/1up/|title=The Indian Biographical Dictionary 1915|publisher=Pillar and Co.|editor=Rao, C. Hayavadana|pages=172-173}}</ref> – 5 June 1939, [[Lucknow]], [[India]]) was a British-trained official who worked in the [[United Provinces of Agra and Oudh|United Provinces]] and served as a Director of Agriculture in [[Bhopal State]]. He worked on the improvement of sugarcane processing. The so-called Hadi or Bhopal method of [[sugarcane]] processing was a major improvement over early processes, with significant savings on losses. He was given the title of [[Khan Bahadur]] for his contributions.

Hadi came from a family of [[Sadaat-e-Bara|Baraha Syeds]] who had fled [[Lucknow]] to [[Muzaffarnagar]] after the Sikhs invaded. A grandfather had been a military officer in Oudh and a collector of revenue in Sultanpur District. Hadi's father had been a Tahsildar in Pratapgarh during Mughal rule who practiced law after English annexation. Hadi studied at Sultanpur High School and was trained at the [[Royal Agricultural University|Royal College, Cirencester]] where he received the Holland Gold Medal. He was later deputed by the [[Oudh State|Oudh]] Talukdars to travel to America in 1888-89 to examine the possibility of technical education for Indian students. He was deputed by the Secretary of State to study in Paris under [[Louis Pasteur]] between 1882 and 1889 and then joined the Agricultural Department in the [[United Provinces of Agra and Oudh|United Provinces]].<ref name=":0" /> Hadi worked under [[William Harrison Moreland|W. H. Moreland]] in the [[United Provinces of Agra and Oudh]].<ref>{{cite journal|author=Moreland, W.H.|title= The sugar industry in the United Provinces| url=https://archive.org/details/agriculturaljour02calcuoft/page/19/mode/1up|journal=The Agricultural Journal of India|year=1907|volume=2|pages=15-21}}</ref> He was appointed assistant magistrate and collector 5 April 1890. Assistant director of land records 1891. Superintendent of inland emigration 1893. He became Deputy Commissioner for [[Pratapgarh, Uttar Pradesh|Pratapgarh]] on 4 January 1911.<ref name=":1">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.109449/page/n177/mode/1up/|title=Who's Who in India|publisher=Newul Kishore Press|year=1911|place=Lucknow|page=185-186}}</ref>

From around 1904 he began to examine sugar production in the United Provinces. He was awarded the title of [[Khan Bahadur]] on 1 January 1907<ref name=":1" /> for his work in developing the so-called Hadi process for refining jaggery from sugarcane with reduced losses. The Hadi method was involved in the reducing losses in the production of ''rab'' (massecuite) and a reduction in the inversion of sucrose by controlling the heat and by the use of centrifugation. Hadi also modified the construction of the pans or ''bels'' in which the cane juice was boiled. The method also involved using slow heating with dilute sodium carbonate and juice of ''[[Okra|Hibiscus esculentus]]'' as a clarifying agent. Scum that floats to the top is removed by hand and no lime is used.<ref>{{cite journal|author1=Clarke, G.|author2=Banerjee, S.C.|year=1910|title=The Efficiency of the Hadi process of sugar manufacture|url=https://archive.org/details/agriculturaljour05calcuoft/page/29/mode/1up|journal=The Agricultural Journal of India|volume=5|pages=28-41}}</ref> This resulted in a yield of 40% sugar from ''rab'' as opposed to 20% in the older process that involved filtering the viscous ''rab'' through jute bags by having people walk over them.<ref>{{cite book|author=Prinsen-Geerligs, H.C.|url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924013863067/page/n85/mode/1up/|title=The World's Cane Sugar Industry. Past and Present.|publisher=Norman Rodger|year=1912|place=Altrincham|pages=55-58}}</ref> He also attempted to produced refined white sugar while in Bhopal around 1908 but this was a failure.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.36288/page/n31/mode/1up/|title=Progress of the Sugarcane Industry in India during the years 1916 and 1917. Bulletin No. 83|publisher=Government Press|year=1919|editor=Barber, C.A.|place=Calcutta|page=25}}</ref> These methods were made completely obsolete by the 1930s by factory production systems based on innovations made in the West Indies and Java.<ref>{{cite book|author=Srivastava, R.C.|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.206089|title=The Open Pan System of white sugar manufacture. Scientific Monograph No. 3.|publisher=The Imperial Council of Agricultural Research|year=1932}}</ref>