Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya

Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya

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Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya Profile

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  • Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya

Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya Biography

Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya is a farmer from Gujarat best known for introducing carrots for Gujaratis, which was till then used as cattle food. Vallabhhai has received various awards and recognition for development and promotion of Madhuvan Gajar carrot variety. In 2017 he has been conferred with the 9th National Grassroots Innovation Award. For his overall contributions towards the field of Indian agriculture, government of India announced Padma Shri on the occasion of 2019 Republic Day celebrations. He is 95+ now, but still active in the field and visits his farm twice a week.

 

Vallabhbhai Vasrambhai Marvaniya was born into an agricultural family of Gujarat. His family traditionally followed farming. He was born in the late 1920s or early 1930s. He used to assist his father in farms. He left his education while studying at class 5 to help his father. In their 5-acre farm, they cultivated pulses, grains, groundnut, and maize, apart from jowar, rajko (a kind of grass meant for fodder) and carrot to feed the cattle. In those days, Gujaratis didn’t know that these grains and vegetables could also be consumed by humans. When he was around 13, in 1943 an interesting incident occurred. While feeding the fodder to the cattle, once Vallabhbhai also tried some carrot and found it very tasty. He then asked his father to sell the surplus carrot on their farm.

 

Initially his father was not convinced to do with this fodder food, and ignored the suggestion. As a child, he dug carrots from ground and filled them in two sacks, with weight around 5 kgs each. He went to nearby market and sold them for rupees 8. His father was surprised to see an extra Rs 8 when he handed over the day’s earnings, a time when even 50 paise was very costly. Later his father supported him to grow and sell carrots. In those days, carrot was hardly heard of, and people used to visit their farm to buy this new vegetable.

 

He applied various methods of sowing and watering, so that branches of carrots are reduced, and vegetable grew straight into the soil. He would also extract the carrots carefully from the soil to keep the shape intact. As it was sweet, strong and could even be eaten raw, people loved it and very soon it turned to be a very successful attempt.

 

Vallabhbhai became the regular supplier of carrots for the langars at the Nawab’s palace, after Nawab of Junagadh, Muhammad Mahabat Khan III came to know about this wonder vegetable. Thus he is credited to introducing carrots to Gujaratis in 1943. After independence he also adopted drip irrigation and mulching methods in his farm and slowly expanded his farms from 4 acres to 40 acres.

Published: January 28, 2019

Updated: January 31, 2019

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