Karra Shashikala- AP’s  lady  ‘Organic ‘ Farmer

Karra Shashikala has won the Mahindra Samriddhi India Agri Award for the ‘Best Female Farmer of the Year 2014 ’. These awards were instituted in 2011 to recognise farmers’ noteworthy and purposeful contribution to the field of agriculture.This reticent lady who hails from Nalgonda district is an organic farmer who produces her own compost fertilizers with cow dung, runs a dairy, cultivates fruit gardens, produces 15 KW power with the gober gas produced through her farm and runs all her pump sets daily on this organic fuel. She also produces organically grown rice and quality vermi- compost manure to other farmers.

 Now all this sounds wonderful, but this didn’t happen overnight and her road to success was not an easy one. Widowed at a very young age in 2004 when she lost her husband Madhav Reddy to a heart attack, this post graduate in Telugu literature was left alone with a 13-year old son to fend for and a debt of Rupees 4.5 lakhs to clear, unhelpful in laws and conniving village hands who were not willing to work for her.

Due to a strong family support & her brother’s help in coming out of depression, she got to work in the fields hands-on and started her tryst with farming and taking care of the cattle. Providence got her in touch with Mrs Sudha Reddy who trained  her about  vermin-compost production and this led her to start her own production in her own farm .This had helped to boost her farm production and sell the compost in higher prices to others. With the profits  earned she cleared her debts, bought two more acres of land , 50 cows for extra production of compost and is now a fully fledged farmer and dairy owner. She had seen the ups and downs of running a farm and has emerged stronger in her will to succeed and this has made her one of the successful and the only female farmer to reckon in the State of Telangana.

Her day starts at 3:30 in the morning,ends in the evening like that of a typical farmer and despite her hectic schedule and work, she is also a happy and proud mother and has educated her son who now works in a high profile IT Company. She is a firm believer in sustainable practices and reinvests her profits into her farm and strives at implementing new farming techniques to increase production. Winner of several other important awards in the past ,she has been an inspiration to at least 10 other  farmers.

TeluguOne tributes this lady farmer from Nalgonda for her indomitable spirit and encouragement to all women in the society!