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Prakash Chandra Panda is perhaps the only one in the
10 km radius of his native Village Kanakpur to possess
a first-class M Phil degree in geography and a B Ed.
With such credentials, his father Trinath Chandra thought,
his son would easily secure a decent white-collared
job and live in the comforts of a city. Instead, Prakash
Chandra not only chose to live in this remote village
but also decided to try his hand at farming, independent
of what his father was doing for years.
To keep his
mental faculties sharp and active and to follow a disciplined
lifestyle, he also took up the job of a local school
teacher six years ago. Prakash had taken land on lease,
near his village, on the banks of Indravati 'right canal',
to cultivate rice. By the time he heard about KARRTABYA's
initiatives with SRI and got interested, it was too
late to try it out in the kharif season. However, since
he was impressed with the merits of this method, he
met with the KARRTABYA team and wanted to know if this
would also work with summer rice.
On coming to know
that the method was not season specific, Prakash decided
to put a two-acre plot under SRI, what became the first
summer crop and also the single largest plot raised
with this novel method. Because of the remoteness of
his village, Prakash was not able to take step-by-step
guidance from KARRTABYA but rely on the few tips he
had received.
Even by following these, he achieved a
major breakthrough. From those 2 acres under SRI, he
harvested 84 quintals of paddy, i.e., 42 quintals per
acre, as against 13 - 15 quintals he used to get before.
His net profit, after meeting the costs of all inputs,
was Rs 32,600/- which is more than double of what he
used to earn by following the conventional method. No
doubt, Prakash would now go for SRI with a vengeance
to earn bigger profits. He has also volunteered to act
as KARRTABYA's resource person in Jaipatna Block area
and share his newly acquired scientific knowledge and
experience with fellow farmers.
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FIELD
STORies
Laxman Sahu has been growing vegetables
besides the staple crop of rice. He lived in a remote
hillside village called Karlaguda, with his wife and
daughter Baladini.
Twenty seven year old Achyutananda
Naik of Village Balichhada joined hands with his father
Sanatana into their two-acre family farm after Class
IX.
Prakash Chandra Panda is perhaps the only one in the 10 km radius of his native Village Kanakpur to possess a first-class M Phil degree in geography and a B Ed.
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