‘Yeh toh chamatkar ho gaya’: How MS Swaminathan, the quiet village of Jaunti changed India’s fate from begging bowl to bread basket

Indian geneticist, plant breeder and humanitarian, Mankombu Sambasivan Swaminathan, is widely known for ushering in the green revolution of India. The laurels that were bequeathed on MS Swaminathan speak of only a part of the work, the soldering-on rather, that he had to in order to change the fate of the country. 

As the story goes, it was MS Swaminathan, and the quiet, nondescript village of Jaunti, along with former minister C Subramaniam and civil servant B Sivaraman who turned the tide for wheat farmers, and subsequently of the nation. 

It goes back to the 1960s, when Swaminathan wrote to Dr Vogel to send him some ‘gaines’ seeds to see if they would flower in India. According to Priyambada Jayakumar’s book on MS Swaminathan titled ‘The Man Who Fed India’, published by HarperCollins, Dr Vogel obliged but also suggested he should get in touch with American agronomist Dr Norman Borlaug, known for developing a high-yielding, short-stalked variety of wheat in Mexico. After pulling a whole lot of strings, Swaminathan managed to bring Borlaug to India. By 1963, Borlaug had sent his best semi-dwarf Mexican wheat to India. 

Swaminathan got the seeds sown in Indore, Kanpur, Delhi, Ludhiana, Pant Nagar (now in Uttarakhand) and Pusa on lands controlled by Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI). The phenomenal yields gave Swaminathan all the proof he needed, the book stated.

‘JAI JAWAN, JAI KISAN’ 

Despite Lal Bahadur Shastri’s cry of ‘Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan’ headlines in 1964 frequently spoke of food shortages and farmer suicides. On June 9, 1964, Shastri, who had just taken over as the prime minister, placed a call to C Subramaniam, a Gandhian who was part of Nehru’s cabinet. Shastri asked him to take over the ministry of Agriculture and Food, as he had found no takers for those roles.

Although surprised, Subramaniam took over as the Minister of Agriculture and Food. The first thing he did was call 20 agricultural scientists to Krishi Bhawan and task them with solving the food shortage, the book stated.

Swaminathan, part of the group, boldly spoke of the semi-dwarf Mexican wheat seeds sent by Borlaug. He was convinced that the yield stagnation in India would be overcome. “What is stopping you then, Swaminathan?” asked Subramaniam. “Money, sir. We don’t have any,” he responded. Swaminathan said how his proposals to the ministry were rejected citing lack of funds, and more importantly, a lack of faith in the new technology. He said India needed to “break the debilitating cycle” and humiliation of “ship-to-mouth existence”, citing imports from the US.

After a long sermon, listing the merits of Borlaug’s seeds, Subramaniam gave his green signal. In fact the demonstrations that they were planning to undertake for the farmers were to be conducted for rice, jowar and bajra too. 

Swaminathan and his team took to touring villages to introduce the Mexican varieties but most farmers wanted subsidies to try them out. The geneticist refused and continued touring with little luck. 

ON TO JAUNTI’S FIELDS

Finally, the farmers in Jaunti, moved by Swaminathan and team’s efforts, agreed to take up the seeds. Fourteen farmers sowed the seeds on 70 acres of land. IARI students mobilised vast numbers of student volunteers to help in the fields. Farmers, students, scientists, research assistants were all out on the fields!

In the 1964-65 Rabi-growing season, Jaunti’s farmers met the target of 4 tonnes per hectare – as opposed to the usual yield of 1-1.5 tonnes per hectare. The farmers were astounded. “Yeh toh chamatkar ho gaya ji,” they said in astonishment. The farmers were also given adequate support by Swaminathan and his team, including extra nitrogen for fertilisers. 

In March-April 1965, rich farmers from within and outside Delhi descended on the fields of Jaunti to witness the “chamatkar”. 

Swaminathan eventually converted the village into a full-fledged ‘seed village’, and in November 1965, the Jawahar Jaunti Seed Cooperative Society was established.

YEARS OF TUMULT

While Shastri had full faith in Swaminathan, the coming months would throw India into a political tumult. The India-Pakistan war broke out which ended on September 23, 1965. However, Lal Bahadur Shastri died on January 11, 1966 in Tashkent. He was then succeeded by Home Minister Gulzarilal Nanda for 13 days before Indira Gandhi was sworn in as the prime minister.

Thankfully, Gandhi had also placed her utmost faith in Swaminathan. Even so, it would take a couple of more years for India to come out of the shortage. By 1968, India was producing an astounding amount of wheat. The book stated that from 4 hectares under cultivation in 1964-65, 1 million hectares were in cultivation in 1968. 

Swaminathan stated that yields achieved in 4,000 years of wheat cultivation in the Indian subcontinent, from the time of Mohenjo Daro, were doubled in just four years from 1964 to 1968. The wheat surplus was so massive that the government had to store the extra grain in schools which were closed for summer holidays.