Tulsi Gondalia took up growing potatoes in a land which is unsuitable for it. With his sheer determination, he has worked wonders
Bengaluru: To swim in the direction of water currents is easy. But it becomes a challenge when one decides to flow against the currents. That is what Tulsi Gondalia, hailing from Gondal tehsil, has done.
Before we proceed, we must inform you that Banaskantha (Gujarat) is one of the most famous names when it comes to growing potato.
But growing the same in climate of Saurashtra is next to impossible. However, this is where Tulsi begs to differ.
He took it up as a challenge. In a very short span of time, he grew 12 tonnes of potatoes, that too, organic ones.
Interestingly, Tulsi used to grow other crops. But as reported by Dainik Bhaskar, it was a priest who advised him to grow organic potatoes.
Putting his advice to practice, Tulsi put his shoulders to the wheels. In this regard, he met many experts and understood the tricks of the trade.
His hard work pays off:
The problem in this part of the country is that it is home to a lot of salty water. To use such water to grow potatoes is infructuous as potatoes become rich in salt and are rendered unusable.
So when Tulsi decided to grow potatoes, he had to get rid of the salty water. For this purpose, he began collecting dam water and rainwater. To this, he added a lot of jaggery in order to make it sweet. Luckily, it worked for him!
After this, he purchased potato seeds and sowed them. In order to ensure it remained organic, he used cow urine, butter milk to protect it from insecticides. He also made sure chemical fertilisers were relinquished.
Furthermore, he made use of drip irrigation. In this way, he worked hard and got a phenomenal yield in less time.
In a matter of months, he earned more than Rs 2 lakh.
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