Backyard Nutritional Kitchen Gardening-A success story of Putul Das

Have you noticed the vegetable plants behind the picture? These are the plants of red amaranth and spinach that Putul has planted, nurturing and also earning livelihood by selling the surplus vegetables. These plants portage the signature of his hard-earned success.

She is Putul Das and this is her success story as a progressive farmer. Putul lives at Paschim Jata village of Kankandighi GP under Mathurapur block II, Sundarban. Her family consists of 3 family members.

Their main livelihood is agriculture. But as the earnings is not enough to fulfill their daily needs simultaneously they go to cities of different states to work as a migrant laborer. They lose their job during the Covid-19 pandemic. They have been living in dire financial straits just at that time like to slay the slain, devastating cyclones like Amphan and Yaas have flooded their farmland with saline water. The consecutive contretemps make them confused and frightened about their survival. Putul realizes that she has to do something to make a living, or else they will not be able to survive.

In such a turbulent time Mukti and “Give India” come forward to help her with the kitchen gardening program. Through the program, she receives a winter vegetable seeds kit to develop a kitchen garden in her backyard. She also has been provided training on how to cultivate the plants using organic manure. She adopts the technology and now she is producing enough vegetables out of which half of the amount is being consumed by her family and half is being sold in local Haat (market) to earn gross income to the tune of approximately 1,500 in a month. She is happy to enhance the nutritional affordability for her family and earn an additional income from the sale of surplus produce. She expresses her heartiest gratitude to Mukti and “Give India.”