Agriculture

"How different would our rural areas be if so many more take up such incredible challenges, instead of their expertise being laid to rest after retirement?," writes a deeply impressed IAS officer Armstrong Pame.

Quitting his job with consultancy giant McKinsey, the founder of Samagra went onto fix some of India's biggest governance problems. And the impact is real.

Originally from the Sumaliyai village of Jaisalmer, Deshal had a rather humble start. His father Kushaldan Charan is a tea-stall owner and has faced financial problems for most of his life.

The school was founded in 2016, by Ashita and Anish Nath, a couple from Lucknow, whose journey towards this phenomenal decision is even more unusual.

Crop productivity in Narayan Lal Gurjar’s village was dropping by 30 per cent. So he used his school lessons to provide an eco-friendly, cost-effective solution to the farmers!

In fact, oyster mushrooms, one of the lesser-known varieties are rich in nutrients and grow very well with leftover straw.

Today, this 37-year-old part-time techie is a full-time farmer who cultivates paddy, coconut, oil palm and cocoa organically, making nearly Rs 10-15 lakh a year!

What sets TEFF apart from the other NGOs working towards the same cause is their realisation that food can be grown anywhere. With the same vision of helping the urban citizens take up farming or gardening in the space that was available to them, TEFF started a Waste Management Park in June 2017.

63-year-old Senthamil Selvan narrates his six-year journey into converting once barren and uncultivable land into a beautiful farm.

Today, NaPanta has reached 1,17,000 farmers. The daily unique farmer visitors are over 3,000, and the daily app interactions are more than 25,000.