There are two chairs, side by side, on a little dry patch, facing the 10,000 sq. feet of vegetable bounty. Even in the dog days of summer, it is pleasant once the entire vegetable garden has been watered. Maybe this patch of green and many others to come, might inspire a few students of the Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad, to start a startup related to horticulture or farming. One really does not know, for there are many high-flying young men and women who are coming back to enjoy the fruits of the soil.
There definitely is a certain pleasure in seeing a plant grow and reap the fruits. In fact, the smell of coriander is so strong here, that one wants to sit there and enjoy the warm breeze, rich with the smell of just-watered earth and the mother of all garnishes.
The initiative is called ISB Goes Green and with this the institute has brought organic vegetable farming into its campus. S. Venkadesan, head of operations and learning resource centre, ISB, came up with the idea of the green patch. "I grew up on a farm. And later when I was working as a scientist in the metallurgy department in Kalpakkam, we had a garden patch of our own. In fact, at one time Tamil Nadu faced a huge rice crisis and then our director, M.H.P. Rao, even allowed us to grow our own patch of rice," he says. And that passion drove him to clean up a patch of land and start planting, not realising that the wild boars within the campus would maraud the land. "There was no protection or fencing and secondly we also suffered from a lack of water," he accepts.
ISB organic garden | Ramchander Pentuker
He realised that if he had to build something sustainable he needed help and so, along with a couple of his colleagues, he spoke with an organic gardener Shyam. Since this was getting more technical, the team got permission from the dean. "I had just returned from Singapore after a conference of librarians at the Singapore Management University (SMU) and saw what they were doing, even with small patches of land. They were distributing seeds in small jute bags with SMU stamped over it. I was enthused and sold the idea to the dean. He agreed."
After that the experiment started with 4,000 sq. ft of land for over six to eight months. They later increased it to 10,000 sq ft and put a proper chain link fence and there was much joy on seeing the green patch grow. But they forgot the peacocks, of which many roam freely on the campus. They would fly in and have a feast on all the seeds, seedlings, and other growing stuff. Soon, they had to get the entire patch covered with a nylon webbing, which would stop the birds, but would allow air to flow.
"We have decided to grow only vegetables, since we already have a rose garden," says Venkadesan, thrilled with this experiment. The people living on the campus are also thrilled that they get some vegetables, especially, spinach (two varieties), brinjal, coriander, radish, carrots, cluster beans, melons at their doorstep and organic to boot. Now they have planted beans, gourds and onion leeks. “Since we do not use chemical fertilisers and pesticides, the flavour and aroma of the food is incomparable," says Venkadesan. "We don’t give away the produce for free because we want people to feel like they have helped in tending for it and that it belongs to them," he says.
Venkadesan wants to experiment with fruits, too. Now that this patch is a success, he has earmarked a few more patches, where he hopes to grow fruits. "We will give it to the departments and they can take care of it and own it up," he says. He is also thinking of asking every student to sponsor one tree each year and return to see its growth and share memories.
ISB has huge acreage and it is being tended to by a huge gang of gardeners. Venkadesan has managed to cut cost by getting a few of them to tend to the kitchen garden. The entire green patch is being wetted by treated water and so there is no strain on the water flow either. "We are now checking for hardy vegetables, which do not need much tending or, for that matter, water," he says. But once the summer is over, the garden should flourish.
While the students do have a tight schedule as far as their course is concerned, those who are interested and can spare some time, do come and help, but otherwise, there are others who come and spend some time, digging and planting when they feel like it and overseeing what the gardeners are doing.
Venkadesan is at his ambitious best when he says "when we scale up, we hope to supply to the canteen, so that the students can have the best of vegetables and fruits," he says. He is talking of a batch of 700 students, plus staff plus families living on the campus. It is like a small town!
"We do not depend on the institute to finance us," says Venkadesan. Now, they are spending only on the seeds and other basic infrastructure and the rest they manage with the money they make from selling the vegetables. They also follow the instructions Shyam gives them and do not have a mono crop—different crops offset the pests apparently.
