60-year-old Ashish Kumar Tripathi looked on at his parched one-acre wheat field in Kanpur Nagar, the soil brittle and lifeless after years of chemical farming. “I would wait for the shopkeeper to give me seeds and fertilisers,” he recalls. “Sometimes they arrived late, sometimes not at all, and every delay meant less harvest.” Debts mounted, seeds would have to be bought from shops at high prices without alternatives, and even his cattle refused to eat the dry, tasteless fodder. Would Tripathi ever be able to get out of this vicious trap?
Hundreds of kilometres away in drought-hit Latur, Mangala Maruti Waghmare’s half-acre plot stood silent waiting for the rains. “Seventy-five percent of my earnings went into buying inputs,” she says. “The rest was never enough for my sons’ education and medical expenses.” When her son fell seriously ill from eating chemically grown food, she drew a quiet line in the sand. “If I cannot eat it, I will not grow it.”
Stories like theirs are not rare in India’s farming belt. Across India, 68.5% of farmers own less than one hectare to till. In recent times, 11,290 farmers and farm labour' suicides, linked to agrarian distress, were reported. Marginal farmers made up 27.4% of those victims. To make it worse, COVID-19 forced thousands of farmers to return to their villages after giving up their urban sources of income. Input costs were high, crop prices had dropped, and agriculture became increasingly unsustainable.
What is rare is what happened next.
Under the global humanitarian and spiritual master, Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s vision, The Art of Living had been training farmers, many of them marginal farmers, in low-cost, chemical-free natural farming techniques that restore soil health, cut input costs, and free families from debt traps. “We have to stop farmer suicides immediately. If the farmer is unhappy, the consumer cannot be healthy either,” Gurudev said, addressing a satsang in Maharashtra in the presence of thousands of farmers.
For Tripathi, it began with unlearning decades of chemical dependence. He learnt how to prepare jeevamrit, a natural growth enhancer, from cow dung, urine, jaggery, pulse flour, and soil. “Earlier, if pests attacked, we’d rush to the market for chemicals. Now I make bio inputs at home. It saves money and gives peace of mind. When fungus appears, I just spray buttermilk. The soil feels alive now,” he smiles. His cattle relish the lush fodder, and even their milk tastes richer. Wheat from his fields now sells for more than double the market price. “When I learnt this program was Gurudev’s vision, I felt part of something much bigger than my farm.”
The revolutionary multi-layer farming “uses vertical space to grow multiple crops at different heights—leafy greens below, vegetables in the middle, fruiting plants and trees above—reducing heat in summer and keeping the soil moist. Even in the hottest months, we can grow methi, which brings high profit for marginal farmers,” shares Rosy Rani from The Art of Living, who trained Tripathi in natural farming. It saves water, reduces pests, and diversifies income.
In Ramel Nagar, Uttar Pradesh, yet another farmer trained by Rani, Chhotelal, found his one-acre farm was in dire straits too. “We were completely broken, health-wise and financially, with little to eat or sell.” He had seen vegetables swell unnaturally overnight from chemical injections and knew they were harming his people.
Today, Chotelal has successfully preserved the Bansi wheat variety using natural methods. “It’s bringing back our local, indigenous crops. These seeds give better yields suited to our climate.” Chhotelal doubled the grain’s value—selling at Rs 56/kg instead of Rs 24. “I now get a 1:2 ratio of wheat to bhusa, so even my cows benefit,” he says. With improved soil health, he reduced irrigation from five rounds to three, saving both water and costs.
“Gurudev’s vision for happier farmers gives me the conviction to continue, no matter the challenges.”
Mangala’s Canopy of Hope
The change is not just in the land. Farmers who once relied entirely on shopkeepers for seeds and fertilisers now run self-help groups to share techniques and seeds, and sell produce collectively. Fields that once remained barren as far as eye could see, now grow multiple crops timed precisely for the markets throughout the year.
Mangala, for example, after the training, times her tomato crop to hit the market during peak summer, when supply is low. Using natural methods—eco-friendly inputs from cow dung and urine, multi-cropping with cabbage, chilli, onions, and garlic—she makes Rs 60,000 in just three months. Today, Mangala, inspired by Gurudev’s vision for all farmers, has trained hundreds of women in the one-acre model. She encourages them to see it as a “pension plan” for future income. She was awarded by the Prime Minister for increasing her profits and empowering other women farmers.
Her husband says, “It’s normal for a farmer with 10 acres to send produce to Bombay. But for one with half an acre in a small village—that’s an achievement.”
