Girl scripts success in vegetable farming

BERHAMPUR: A 17-year-old girl of Gocha village in Ganjam district has become an example of sorts in vegetable farming. The successful woman farmer, Anjali Sahu, has also encouraged locals to take up vegetable cultivation in large scale.

Born in a middle class farmer’s family, Anjali is the youngest among her four brothers and four sisters. Her father Gopinath Sahu owns more than an acre of land and ekes out a living from farming in the village, around 25 km from Soroda town. He managed to get his two sons and three daughters married.
Amid poverty, Anjali somehow completed her matriculation, but suppressed her inner will for higher education to take up farming as a career option. 

She decided to assist her parents in their traditional farming with new techniques. As Gopinath is unable to work in the field due to his old age, his third son Saroj entered into farming. Now Anjali joined him in the farming. They enter their farm field with crowbar and pickaxe and return with a basket full of fresh vegetables. Her endeavour to grow vegetables has yielded results and attracted several other farmers.
They mostly raise vegetables like brinjal, bitter gourd, snake gourd and lentil, and sell it in the village market. She has also been imparting training to other farmers of the village briefing them about advantages

of the techniques. 
“We have been successful in growing different varieties of vegetables. We have been focussing on the quality of crops and vegetables and for that, seeds were sown on different heights in the same field,” Anjali said.