Gummalla Venkata Krishna Bapineedu recalls the day while he escaped the jaws of death in the nick of time.
“11 years in the past, once I turned into working in the area, a snake bit me. For more than an hour, the chew becomes undetected till I collapsed on the sphere and couldn’t increase my arm. I soon commenced frothing and changed into rushed to a health center within the nearest taluk, and later shifted to Hyderabad for treatment.”
Doctors are known as him fortunate. Family and friends heaved a sigh of comfort and matters seemed exceptional. But Bapineedu felt distressed, as though something was not right. The trouble becomes, destiny became now not finished with him. The following 12 months, he again stared on the face of demise during a harrowing twist of fate. Ironically, he was on his way to the medical institution for treatment.
“While touring on my two-wheeler to board a bus to the metropolis-based totally medical institution for treatment, a dashing vehicle rammed into me. The twist of fate turned into excessive sufficient to make hospital calls frequent over the next few years,” he stocks with a rueful twist to his mouth.
As the pronouncing is going, when the going gets tough . . . . The difficult listen to the two close-calls with death and exchange, for the better. And that is precisely what took place at Bapineedu.
“I couldn’t farm for almost 3 years because of the coincidence. I needed to deliver the farm on lease. When I recovered, I determined I needed to cross naturally. It might seem suddenly and absolutely unrelated, however farming is my career. And I am placing meals on human beings’ plates. I needed to make my profession significant and grow poison-free, chemical-free food.”
Bapineedu’s trade of heart sprung from his need to grow visha-Mukta Mahar (chemical-loose-meals) for his youngsters and different people. And he did not back off from the trade and the challenges that include it.
He began his adventure of herbal farming with the aid of attending workshops and following the zero-budgeting canons of the well-known agriculturist, Subhash Palekar.
Bapineedu has a 30-acre farm where he now grows natural produce, but how the farmland came to him is another interesting tale.
He turned into the most effective 5 years old when his father determined to depart everything in the back after selling their 3-acre farm. The family moved from their local village of Rangampeta in East Godavari District of Andhra Pradesh and migrated 750 km away to Budihal Camp in Sindhanur, Raichur district in Karnataka.
All the money that his father had became spent on buying a 30-acre land near this faraway village they now referred to as domestic. It turned into aloof and reduced the world’s relaxation without energy, water connection, or faculties inside the location.
When his father realized the move to Karnataka had disadvantaged his primary training kids, he attempted to fill the gap by bringing a personal show to the village in 1973. He paid Rs.500 consistently with month to him to educate his four youngsters. He even built a domestic for the teacher and furnished him with the required amenities.
The teacher soon got bored living the village life and left. Later, almost all the siblings became engaged with farming activities besides Sridhar, who was given risk at formal schooling.
And so, for as long as he can bear in mind, Bapineedu has been working as a farmer. It’s been an adventure of four decades. The own family-controlled to shop for a tractor in 1986 to broaden the complete 30-acres.