A machine that turns garbage into gold? That’s not the punchline of a WhatsApp forward — it’s a project being developed and will be deployed in Meerut, according to Uttar Pradesh minister Dharampal Singh.
He, however, has added that there is a “little problem” with the machine project as of now.
In a video shared by journalist Narendra Pratap, Singh, minister of UP’s animal husbandry and milk development, is seen as saying in Hindi: "The things that are put in the drains, some dirt, some leaves, we told them to remove them and clean them. And the wet garbage that you leave there, then it reaches the drain. Take that wet garbage immediately and work in a clean environment. Here, there is a plan to make gold out of garbage. That machine is getting ready soon. There are some problems. When it is done, then in Meerut, gold will be made out of garbage."
If it is true, scientists in Geneva may want to pack their bags and head to Meerut for a live demo on how to create gold using wet waste.
Earlier this month, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research – better known as CERN – had reported that “near-miss collisions between high-energy lead nuclei” at the Large Hadron Collider have generated “intense electromagnetic fields that can knock out protons and transform lead into fleeting quantities of gold nuclei”. However, these were fleeting moments, meaning the gold was not actually created to last.
Apart from the science, Singh’s statement comes with a level of irony that would be hard to script. After all, it was the BJP that once turned Rahul Gandhi into the butt of jokes over a similar-sounding thing.
Back in 2017, during a speech in Gujarat, Rahul had mocked Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s promises by saying: “He [Modi] said to potato farmers that he will install such a machine where potato is inserted from one side and gold will come out from another side... Not my words, these are the words of Narendra Modi.”
A clipped version of the speech soon went viral, removing all context and making it appear as though Rahul Gandhi himself was promising this golden aloo contraption. The BJP pounced. Memes flew, slogans were coined, and leaders chimed in. Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma took a jab saying, “Coal on the stove? We were just getting over gold from potatoes idea.”
Now, with Dharampal Singh’s garbage-to-gold machine in the works, Meerut might become India’s El Dorado — provided citizens sort their trash and wait patiently for gold bars to tumble out.
Until then, CERN can continue with its particle smashing.