Moong Over Microchips

by Venkat Iyer

  I got the prescribed rice, GR4, from a shop at Dahanu and broadcast it across the field. We had got the land ploughed using a traditional plough rather than a tractor or tiller which was expensive. There was no question of spraying any chemical or putting urea in the field. I had a large number of visitors from the village who came to see the wonder rice that grows without any external input. Besides, they had never heard of anyone just broadcasting the seeds across the field.

  We harvested about 100 kilograms, which was far below average. We realized that we would have to fine-tune the process next time. Obviously, we had done something wrong. We also realized that it was one thing to read and listen to people and another to actually practise what we read. Farming is something which does not come with a well-written manual and a convenient ‘F1’ or help button like most software. It has to be practised for years and learnt directly from nature itself. What worked for one farmer would prove detrimental to another. The parameters for each field and location varied.

  This is also one of the major reasons why various research and experiments conducted by scientists at institutes sometimes fail when rolled out into the fields. Under a controlled environment, with a small area to be monitored, the results are easier to achieve while on acres of land open to the uncertainties of nature, the results can be extremely varied.

  We learnt the hard way that it was not enough just to broadcast rice all over the field and expect a good harvest. We had to innovate and experiment to find the right method which suited the soil and environmental conditions. We would have to try year after year to reach some level of efficiency. We were convinced of one thing though, that there was no need to use chemicals and pesticides. We only had to learn how to harness the immense potential of available resources to our benefit. This was something that would not happen overnight and we had a long learning curve to pass through.

  We decided to try and sell the little rice we had harvested directly. Our earlier experience had taught us a lesson and we decided to ignore the traders or the so-called organic shops. Meena and I sent text messages to all our friends. It was a pleasant surprise when within three days the rice was completely sold out. We suddenly realized that there were people who were interested in organic produce and willing to buy it from us. We could do away with the middlemen but we had the additional task of packing and delivering the material to the consumers.

  We had charged Rs 20 per kilo and much later people called up and informed us that they were willing to pay even up to Rs 30. We had not got the rice polished but just dehusked and cleaned. It looked a bit brown in colour but the taste was exceptional, though the grains were not even. The proceeds from the sale of the rice did not even cover the cost of production. I did feel tense and worried that we were making a loss, considering that we had no other income other than Meena’s salary from her job at The Hindu.

  During the first few weeks after the harvest, I panicked and even contemplated rushing back to the city and looking for another corporate job. I had bouts of depression and went into long periods of mourning thinking of the foolish move I had made. I kept thinking that I had invested all my hard-earned money into the venture and was not even getting enough returns. I would probably have got more money just keeping the money in a bank or a fixed deposit. It was only after a number of meaningful discussions with Meena and reading a lot of books that I realized that things were not as bad as they seemed. It was just a question of time.

  We reasoned that even though we had not made any profit from the rice crop, we had not dug into our capital. We were still living within our budget. It had hardly been a year since we started this venture. There is nothing common between software and farming and it would take me some time to learn the nuances of this new skill. It would be foolish to conclude that I had failed in this venture without giving it the right amount of time.

  With renewed enthusiasm, I returned to my farming activities. I started planting vegetables around the farm. Everything was in small quantities though many people approached me with proposals to plant a single vegetable across the land. They were willing to share the profits with me equally. We were clear that we would not opt for monocropping as it would be both a risk and a bad thing for the soil. I was even approached by an exporter from Mumbai who proposed that he would buy all the produce from the farm and pay me 30 per cent premium over the prevalent market rate. He was exporting the fruits and vegetables to New Zealand and Canada where there was a high demand for organically grown crops. It was a lucrative proposal but we could not get around to agreeing to it. I felt it was better if we could sell our produce locally.

  Anyway, the quantity from the farm was not enough for bulk sales. I was happier to barter the produce with the villagers around who gave me vegetables I did not have on the farm in return. It was a good arrangement as we got to eat a variety of vegetables. I thought it would only be a matter of time before we almost stopped buying from the market and were completely eating what we grew on the farm. But that has not been the case—over the years we found that not all vegetables grew well at the farm and we could grow only local, seasonal vegetables.

  We also observed that after eating the vegetables grown at the farm, our palates sometimes did not accept the vegetables available in the city market. Most of the vegetables we could buy in Mumbai were at least three days old. It is a different experience to go to the vegetable patch and pluck just what we wanted.

  I had read up a great deal on organic farming and its benefits. I had a lot of book knowledge but still yearned to see some real fields that worked on the principle of organic farming. I made a trip to visit some farmers in the nearby state of Madhya Pradesh. I also visited some famous farms around our area which practised farming without chemicals. I made a fruitful trip to Tamil Nadu to attend a training session with some veteran organic farmers. It was a joy to see so many like-minded people who had switched over from chemical farming to organic farming. The trip made me feel confident that we had taken the right step in opting for organic farming and it would not be long before we would reap the benefits from our land.

  I also visited the Late Bhaskar Save, who had his natural farm in nearby Umbargaon. It was a treat to sit and listen to him talk about natural farming and the ill effects of chemicals. He had switched over to natural farming way back in 1960 and the legendary Masanobu Fukuoka had visited his farm in 1988. During one of our informal chats he said something that would remain with me forever. He said, ‘Nature will only provide for your needs, not for your greed. Farming is not a manufacturing business; it is a way of life.’

  I sheepishly told him how I too had fallen for the greed factor. I had planted a lemon tree in the first year itself. The tree had grown well but there were no fruits. In my desire to get fruits I had called up all kinds of people, from scientists to village elders to nursery owners, trying to find ways of making the tree fruit. They gave various suggestions which I diligently tried on the tree for four years.

  This was the advice they gave me:

  Stop watering after the monsoon: This was done for two seasons and nothing came of it.

  Cut a small one-inch portion from the main stem: This resulted in the entire tree turning yellow and almost dying. The amount of flak I received from Meena for this experiment cannot be documented.

  Dig pits around the tree and fill with ash and compost: This resulted in the tree growing faster and has reached almost twelve feet.

  Bury the fresh entrails of a goat: Got the entrails from the village and buried it without any change in the tree’s behaviour.

  Tie a chappal to the tree: This was done but the chappals were taken away by some thieves.

  Bhaskar smiled at me when he heard what I had done to the tree and said, ‘Go back and apologize to the tree. She will fruit when she is ready.’ I returned to the farm and asked for forgiveness from the tree for torturing it. Finally, after seven years of planting it, the tree started giving lemons. The lemons were the size of cricket balls. I
t was nature’s way of accepting my apology.

  During my various trips I made copious notes on whatever information I gathered and maintained a diary. This was extremely useful when some kind of pest attacked our crop and we had to find a non-toxic solution to it. I observed that by adding the leaves of the common calotropis plant to the base of the coconut trees, the yield was better. The nuts grew bigger and were sweeter than before. When we had bought the land we had got only three coconuts from our trees and a year later the same trees had more than two dozen each.

  I also had back copies of the Honeybee magazine with me, which was a treasure chest of solutions to numerous problems. Honeybee is a magazine published by the Society for Research and Initiatives for Sustainable Technologies and Institutions (SRISTI), a non-governmental organization which was set up in 1993 to strengthen the capacity of grassroots inventors and innovators.

  By now, I was starting to enjoy my farming experience. We were yet to generate any income from the farm. All we got was a lot of food to consume. These were grown organically and were extremely tasty. I was reminded of the fruits I ate as a child which Patel uncle, my neighbour, gave me from his garden. Our fruits too tasted different from the ones we bought from the market.

  It was now clear that farming did not generate much income. If we did aspire for a lot of cash we would have to grow large quantities of crops. It was viable to transport the produce to Mumbai and sell it only if the output was huge. The small quantities that we produced were sufficient only for our consumption and maybe for some barter at the village or small local sales. I had reconciled to the fact that money was not important if you wished to live in the village and tried to live off the land. I realized that it was more important that we managed to grow all the crops that we needed at the farm rather than concentrate on one crop that gave us cash income.

  A few months later, we had harvested groundnuts and extracted several tins of oil. I was sure that we could manage to live a healthy and sustainable life at the village.

  After I started living at the farm, I changed my lifestyle completely. I switched over to using public transport for my travels. I took out the car rarely. Branded clothes were out and it was a long time before I bought any new clothes. Anyway at the farm, one was not expected to wear designer clothes. A pair of shorts and a T-shirt were more than enough for the kind of work we did there. I realized that it was just a case of reducing the dependency on money.

  The Water Diviner

  One of the first things we had to do after we bought the land was to find drinking water since the river water was not potable and the village relied on wells. The nearest well for us was almost half a kilometre away. We decided to look for groundwater on the land so we could dig a borewell. People around the village relied on an old man who used a coconut to find water. This man walked around the field with a coconut in his palm. The spot where the coconut moved in his palm would have water or so he claimed. Everyone in the village seemed convinced that this would work and they claimed that he had a high success rate. Most of the water he found was around 30–50 feet deep.

  We were not very convinced by the coconut method and decided to search on the Internet for a better option. Our search led us to Michael Davis, a water diviner. Water diviners are people who are gifted with the special power to find water even if it is deep underground. It is very similar to the coconut method except that they use special implements to assist them and are thought to be more reliable.

  I went to meet Davis and was impressed by him and his work. He explained the difference between his search and a normal ‘coconut’ search at the village. His technique was to find geothermal water. This water is supposed to rise from the very core of the earth as steam till it reaches a sort of rocky aquifer and cools to form a stream of water under the rock. The coconut method is usually used to find water that is fed by the rains and is not reliable in seasons where the rainfall is less or nil.

  He also gave us references and asked us to get in touch with people who had used his help to understand his method and success rate first-hand. We spoke to a number of people who had used his skills and were pleased that most of them were happy with the results. We thought Davis was a better option as he had a ‘98 per cent strike rate’ and looking at the long term it was better to catch geothermal water than rainfed water.

  And so on a warm Sunday in May 2004 just before dawn I drove Michael to the farm. We had packed sandwiches and two huge plastic cans of iced water which he had specially requested. As soon as we reached the farm, he had a quick smoke. Then he walked around the farm to observe the place. He explained to me the importance of every plant and tree that he came across. As we passed the fig trees, he said that they were a pointer that water was always close at hand.

  He pointed to the branches of trees like banyan and bamboo and said they always bent towards the source of the water. By walking around Michael made an assessment of the farm and used the trees to find out where water could be available under the ground. The clump of bamboo at the river edge of the farm had branches which sloped down to the ground. This indicated that water was near. The area with a few eucalyptus trees near the other edge would not be suitable since these trees usually sucked up all the water. He pointed to the beehives and said the bees too were an indicator that water was there in the area.

  We came back to the house for sandwiches and lots of water. Michael then started off on his second round, this time with an old silver pocket watch which he used as a pendulum to dowse. The last time Michael talked a lot but this time he only muttered to himself. The pendulum moved to and fro and at certain points it moved crazily. At this point, he would stop and move the pendulum all around the area to ascertain where exactly it went crazy. I was reminded forcefully of Professor Calculus in the Tintin comics.

  As he had predicted, near the fig trees the pendulum moved around furiously but it was at the bamboo clumps near the river that it moved the fastest. After the second time, he came back to the house to drink phenomenal quantities of water. When he went back to the field, he focused on the five points where he observed the pendulum moving really fast. He kept chanting to himself, watching the pendulum at these specific points. I noticed that he looked very tired and when he came back to the house, he took an hour’s break during which he barely spoke and chanted under his breath. We had more sandwiches and vadas and after this Michael went back to the two spots he had selected, one under the bamboo clump and the other near the main gate.

  This time he had additional equipment—two right-angled metal rods which he held in his hands with the angles away from each other. As he reached these two spots, the metal rods would swing towards each other and start vibrating. The other equipment he used was a forked stick, to the ends of which he tied a yellow plastic bag filled with water. The pendulum was now in his pocket. As he moved the forked stick towards the spot under the bamboo clump, the plastic bag started spinning around in circles. I saw the heavy water bag whirring around, and once or twice, the spinning became so furious that the stick and the bag flew out of his hands. When this happened, he asked me to move aside as he had no control over the movements of the bag. Michael would have to walk a few feet to collect the bag and the stick.

  This furious activity went on for a while. In the silence, I could hear the ‘whoosh’ of the bag as it spun. It was fascinating to watch the bag go round and round crazily when he brought it close to the spot. Just to make sure I had a try at it and was surprised when I could not even make it go round once. It had to be some special power that made it whirr so crazily. I was thrilled and satisfied that I had the skills of a special person to find water.

  Michael took out his pendulum and sat on his haunches on the ground to identify the exact spot where water could be found underground. He kept moving around the spot in circles with the pendulum to find the exact place to dig. This took about forty-five minutes, at the end of which he placed an iron rod on the ground.

  I assumed this was
the place I would have to dig for water. It was almost evening by then. He identified an alternative spot near the gate using the same rods and the plastic bag. Here too he marked the spot with an iron rod. Once this work was done, he broke his silence. He said the first spot was an ideal location for water but in case that was not possible, the one near the gate would be just as suitable.

  He also gave us detailed descriptions of what would happen when we started digging the bore well. It was almost a month later while digging the well that we observed Michael’s predictions coming true. Even the colour of the soil being thrown up was exactly what he had told us. Needless to say we struck water at thirty feet but went on to dig to 250 feet as per his instructions. This was to ensure that we had water even during the lean months.

  I got the water tested at a laboratory in Mumbai to check if it was potable. Luckily for us the report was positive. This was one of the major risks that we had noted in our original plan. If there was no drinking water, it would have become difficult to continue living there.

  6

  First Year at the Farm

  Groundnut Harvest

  As the days passed by, and I spent more time at the farm, I learnt the finer points of growing various crops, their harvesting and care. I observed that each crop had its own method of sowing and harvesting. The pests and diseases that attacked each crop were also different. The treatment for each of these problems was a challenge in itself. To add to my problems there was no clear way to handle these problems organically. It was more of a trial-and-error method that gave results.

  It was in November 2004 after the monsoon crop that we decided to plant groundnuts. Providentially, the day the groundnut seeds were being distributed I did not have enough money and could buy only two bags or 60 kilograms of seeds. The saga of the nuts started when we were informed gleefully by the villagers that we had to shell the groundnuts before sowing them. Well, we started in earnest only to find that at the end of the week, the two of us had just managed to shell only a quarter of a sack. This was the one time we really wished we had a large family with lots of uncles, aunts, kids and grandparents like most people in the village.