A RARE GRAIN
Giving in to the fertiliser lobby, the Bengal government has failed to promote a paddy variety that can be consumed simply after soaking—a meal for those who can’t afford fuel
At a time when the Narendra Modi government is striving to deliver LPG connections to India’s poorest households, agricultural scientists in West Bengal have revived a traditional foodgrain that doesn’t need to be cooked. Komol—grown over the past decade at the agricultural training institute in Phulia (Nadia district)—is an indigenous strain of paddy that can be consumed simply after soaking for about 30 minutes.
Anupam Paul, assistant director at the institute, who helped bring back this and 430 other indigenous paddy varieties, says Komol is a high-yielding variety at 4-4.5 tonnes per hectare, with the added benefit of not requiring any chemical fertilisers or pesticides. After soaking, it can be consumed like ordinary rice and is particularly tasty with curd and jaggery.
Agriculture department officers say that many of the tribal households, receiving rice from the government at Rs 2 a kilo, have been forced to sell the subsidised grain because they cannot afford the high cost of fuel for cooking. “Komol can be a boon for people in the backward and tribal areas,” they say.
Despite all its promise, especially eliminating the need for cooking and fuel, Komol has somehow never been promoted by the state government. State agriculture department officials blame it on the “chemical fertiliser lobby”, which is allegedly opposed to traditional grains whose seeds can be propagated and do not require synthetic fertilisers. “These indigenous grains need organic manure,” says an official. The same fertiliser lobby,
WITH PEOPLE SHOWING INTEREST IN KOMOL AT A RECENT EVENT, THE GOVERNMENT MAY NOW POPULARISE IT
many believe, was behind the departure of the pro-organic farming agriculture minister, Purnendu Bose. Bose was responsible for bringing 100,000 hectare out of 4.4 million hectare of agricultural land under organic farming. Abruptly divested of the agriculture portfolio, he was reassigned to the relatively low-profile technical education department in September. Political grapevine has it that Bose had serious differences with the state’s agriculture advisor, P. Mazumdar, who is reportedly close to the fertiliser industry.
However, the state government seems to have woken up this week. Noticing the interest in Komol at the recent Maati Utsav, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced that her government will popularise it.
The state government’s reluctance to promote indigenous strains has a high cost for the farmers and the environment. Consider this: the initial input cost of cultivating Komol is about Rs 35,000 per hectare but comes down to Rs 27,000 per hectare by the fourth year (the organic manure used increases micronutrients in the soil besides increasing crop yield). Successive cropping cycles using organic manure enhance soil fertility. In comparison, the cost of growing the new hybrid paddy varieties (Rs 36,000-40,000 per hectare) increases constantly due to inflation in the cost of chemical fertilisers. The continuous use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides ruins the soil ecosystem. Paul of the Phulia agricultural institute and his associates say that farmers this year cultivated 150 tonnes of the indigenous variety Kaala Bhaat, which is known to have anti-carcinogenic medicinal properties and is rich in iron. He says such varieties will find their market among increasingly health-conscious consumers.