Tana Bhagats adopt modern farming, harvest cash crops

Gumla: The Tana Bhagat community here is gradually embracing modern farming techniques to harvest cash crops on their land in a bid to increase their household incomes.
“In order to encourage them to opt for modern farming techniques, 50 families from the community have been given tractors (in a group of five each), along with tillers, threshers and water pumps,” Gumla DC Sushant Gaurav said on Friday.
“With mechanised tilling techniques, they are now harvesting cash crops such as ginger, chilli, mustard and gram, besides their mono-cropping yield of paddy,” Gumla district agriculture officer Ashok Sinha said.
Tana Bhagats, who are followers of Gandhian principles and descendants of those who took part in Mahatma Gandhi’s Non-Cooperation Movement, are closely guarded with primitive ways of living.
As per Gumla’s administrative records, there are 1,182 Tana Bhagat families who are spread across 10 out of 12 blocks of the districts.
“Over 824 Tana Bhagat families have been covered under commercial farming, including horticulture. As many as 36 families are associated with dairy farming,” Gaurav added.
Gaurav further said the administration was extending help to the community, which has over 7,000 members, by apprising them of the benefits of several government schemes. “As many as 17 girls have been admitted to nursing training institutes while 52 boys have been admitted to Jharkhand Raksha Shakti University.”