While the rest of the world was keeping track of day-to-day COVID-19 cases, Shrekanth RG and his family were foraging for fruit for breakfast at a farm in Pavunjur near Chengalpet, Tamil Nadu. The family of three — including Shrekanth’s wife Banu and nine-year-old son Aarush who is being unschooled — have been spending the lockdown between three farms in Chengalpet, Tiruvallur, and Kanchipuram districts. They have been living off farm produce — sometimes, just fruit for all three meals of the day.
Chennai-based photographer P Panneerselvam made up his mind to relocate to his ancestral farmland in Sooradimangalam village, seven kilometres from Kalpakkam. He and his wife Parvathavarthini Eswaran, an artist, lived in Ekkattuthangal in Chennai during pre-pandemic times. “After the lockdown was announced, we spent 30 days indoors. We do not have a television set at home — we never felt the need for one — so we played indoor games, caught up on news online...we found it difficult to stay cooped up at home. Finally, we decided to pack our bags and move to Sooradimangalam,” explains Panneerselvam.
Vinod Jayaprakash did not want his 10-year-old son Kishore spending lockdown glued to a mobile phone or laptop screen. The Chennai-based businessman who makes metal sheets, decided to shift base for three months to his one-and-a-half acre farm near Sriperumbudur. “We moved there along with my friend’s family; they have a 11-year-old daughter,” he explains. Vinod grows apples, oranges, strawberries, papaya, grapes, walnuts, and almonds in the farm. “I would wake up at 5 am every day to water and tend to the plants,” he says. The kids would join him too.