Development Programmes

There are people living in villages in Rajasthan who depend on earth that looks more like sand than soil. On a level playing field, their traditional expertise is equal to the task of coaxing adequate crops from the earth to live a life of food security, and exist free from the deadening battle for survival which has instead dominated their existence. But with the water table dropping and the earth drying up, things became difficult. And when their traditional techniques are teased away from them by a programme of disinformation and government propaganda, sponsored by world trade institutions with sinister agendas, their task became too heavy, and the battle became a losing one.

It is perhaps fitting that an institute inspired by the principles of Mahatma Gandhi should find that the way to win this battle is by recognizing that fighting it on the wrong terms is counter-productive. The conditions for the fight are rejected. Instead of using marketed weapons to battle with unfertile soil, the weapons become the enemy, and the farmer turns back to treating his land as an ally. The problem ceases to be how to use new technologies and seeds to produce enough to gain the rewards promised by government and corporation, but how to regain the traditional techniques that have been undermined by the stealthy spread of these revolutionary aids.

Further augmentations to the initial water management initiatives focus on broadening the economic base of the communities. Rather than relying on exporting crops, we strongly recommend to the people that they first make sure they can feed themselves, before considering selling produce. Under our guidance the number of crops being grown increases and diversifies. So we see fields of vegetables, and fruit trees, watered by new irrigation systems, where previously there were sandy swathes of cereal, destined for sale. In this way, the people are able to maintain a better standard of nutrition, and a far greater sense of economic independence.

We encourage the people to treat agriculture as an integrated part of the village structure, rather than simply a source of income. As such, we urge the village to broaden its activities to include animal husbandry in a basic symbiotic cycle relationship with agriculture. By keeping cows or buffalo for example, the villagers instigate a cycle of activities, with the animals as a link, which requires fodder on one hand, but provides milk, compost and possibly biogas on the other. These outputs eliminate the need for purchase of commodities like chemical fertilizer, thus reducing the need for dangerously comprehensive participation in the wider economy at the expense of self-sufficiency.