Do you know, a mega kitchen at a temple in India is practicing Operational excellence to feed ~18,000 people a day that too free of cost?
A temple at Shegaon in Maharashtra – Shree Gajanand Maharaj Sansthan is serving Mahaprasad (food that is a blessing of god) to almost 5,000 people at a time without any chaos.
Approximately 25,000 to 30,000 devotees are served Mahaprasad daily at Shegaon temple including other places of Shegaon Sanshtan around 45,000 devotees are served Mahaprasad daily.
The preparations of the ‘Mahaprasad’ begin as early as 5.00 a.m every day. The approach is highly systematic and streamlined. First of all the ‘chapatis (Indian Bread)’ are prepared with the help of the chapatti maker machine. After that, the vegetables are cooked. Later on the rice is prepared and at last the ‘varan (Indian Daal)’ is prepared. As all these dishes are cooked in one hall, the ‘ladoos (Indian Desert)’ are prepared in another hall. The people who cook these dishes are known as ‘sevadharies (devotees who have volunteered). ‘
Even the work responsibilities are clearly assigned and highly streamlined that there are clearly defined work hours and responsibilities for the devotees who are in charge of the kitchen. As in, there are 3 – 4 cooks and 20 devotees to prepare 2,500 ladoos daily, 5 cooks and 8 – 10 devotees to cook rice, dal & vegetables and under the supervision of one devotee, there are 25 to 30 devotees who operate the ‘chapati’ making machine.
The Chapati making machine is so streamlined that there 2 different machines for making chapatti dough and the chapatis. The dough of chapatti is prepared first and then the dough is transferred into the chapati machine which rolls out 10,000 chapatis at a time in one hour.
The process is streamlined in such a way that quality is assured right from the source. Once prepared, the chapatis are piled in the bundles of 125, wrapped in a soft cloth and then put in the hot case before serving the people.
Hence, as you can see; the streamlined work, the quality control and the management of crowd which is an inherent culture at the temple. If a temple kitchen is using quality control and operational excellence tools and techniques, have you embarked on the journey to excellence?
Compiled by Faber Priyal
