Karo Sambhav is addressing this challenge by building grassroots collection networks and advanced recycling technologies that recover critical minerals, cut toxic informal recycling practices, and create safer jobs.
Challenge
In India, most e-waste ends up in informal scrapyards where wires are burned to copper and circuit boards are soaked in acid baths. Workers—often women and children—breathe toxic fumes without protection, while mercury, cadmium, and brominated flame retardants pollute the soil and water.
At the same time, valuable resources are wasted. Electronics contain metals such as copper, tin, aluminium, gold, silver, and rare earths vital for clean technologies. Yet with most recovery happening informally, metals are lost or extracted at poor quality. India’s reliance on virgin material grows, even though recycling precious metals is estimated to be 300 times less environmentally damaging than new extraction.
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Solution
This double loss—human health compromised and resources squandered—is what Karo Sambhav’s project set out to change.
Karo Sambhav connects grassroots collection with high-quality recycling. Its networks span retailers, repair shops, offices, and community groups, creating easy ways for citizens and businesses to hand over end-of-life electronics. Once collected, e-waste is channelled into facilities that prioritise safe, efficient recovery.
Through partnerships with research institutions such as IIT Roorkee, University of Leeds, government bodies such as the Department of Science and Technology, and the Ministry of Mines, as well as international organisations such as GIZ, Karo Sambhav is developing new recycling pathways for some of the toughest fractions: neodymium and dysprosium from magnets, indium and tin from LCD screens, and complex plastics laced with additives. By collaborating with a precious metal refining company, it ensures the recovery of high purity gold, silver, and copper from printed circuit boards using advanced metallurgical processes.
The company’s model is not just technical but social. Two decentralized recycling units now provide safe, formal employment for around 150 workers, nearly half of them women, including those who previously worked inthe informal waste sector. Training and protective measures transform what was once hazardous labour into safer and more, sustainable jobs.
Between October 2022 and October 2024, Karo Sambhav recovered 2,512 tonnes of iron, 200 tonnes of aluminium, 85 tonnes of copper, and recycled179 tonnes of printed circuit boards.
Impact
Each tonne extracted displaces virgin mining, preventing thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions and conserving natural ecosystems.
The social shift is visible. Families once reliant on unsafe scrap work now have steady incomes. For communities, cleaner air has replaced the haze of burning plastic.
Financially, the model is viable. Recovered metals are sold back into manufacturing, while Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) services for brands support viability gap. High-purity recovery boosts yields, making every kilogram of e-waste more valuable.
Karo Sambhav also helps shape the system itself. In 2019, they co-developed the ‘Circular Economy Roadmap for E-waste; with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY), Gol for NITI Aayog. In 2023, Karo Sambhav supported the Department of Telecommunications (DOT), Gol, on a Circular Economy strategy. In 2024, Karo Sambhav contributed to discussions on themes under ITU-T SG5, including environment, climate action, and the circular economy.
Future outlook
By 2027, Karo Sambhav aims to establish new recycling solutions in India for the recycling of various challenging e-waste fractions. The goal is not only ‘scale’, but ‘quality’: to ensure critical raw materials are recovered at purity levels that allow reintegration into manufacturing, closing the loop instead of downcycling.
Karo Sambhav is proving that e-waste is not the end of the line but a critical resource stream—one that can cut emissions, reduce toxic work, and power the net-zero transition.
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Founded in 2017, Karo Sambhav is a market leader in enabling a circular economy in India. It manages waste/end-of-life products across e-waste, plastics, batteries, and glass waste by establishing collection channels, high-quality recycling infrastructure, and solutions for secondary raw material utilization. It collaborates with leading enterprises, multi-laterals, and governments on Circular Economy and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) frameworks and has engineered an IT platform which fosters transparency, and traceability in waste collection, recycling and secondary materials management. Karo Sambhav has set-up collection channels in over 70+ cities covering all states of India and is establishing a network of recycling facilities of which two are operational. Recognized for its contributions to the circular economy, Karo Sambhav received the ‘Social Entrepreneur of the Year India – 2021’ award by the Schwab Foundation, World Economic Forum.
