Jayeshbhai’s tale of hope, success and incredible generosity

It’s the summer of 2018, Jayeshbhai Ramchand, a traditional farmer from Gujarat had subscribed for AgroStar’s Gold service. Jayeshbhai had been planting watermelon for many years, however, he was facing many challenges such as wilting, and low crop yield, among others. After consulting our Agri doctors in the region through the gold service, Jayeshbhai took a leap of faith and decided to use agri inputs and advice as recommended by AgroStar in his field. Jayeshbhai was initially not satisfied with the results. It was Agri Doctor Sambhaji who took it upon himself to instill confidence in Jayeshbhai for his live watermelon crop.

As a result, Jayeshbhai recovered his entire plot and got a healthy crop of watermelon. This turn of events gave Jayeshbhai a lot of hope and firmly placed his loyalties with AgroStar. Just as things were getting better, the country was hit by the pandemic-induced lockdown. This, as we know, had a massive impact on people from all walks of life including the farmers of our country. Jayeshbhai had a good crop of produce but he could no longer sell it in the market. To overcome this hurdle, Sambhaji, advised Jayeshbhai to sell his produce himself on the roadside at retail price. Hope returned to Jayeshbhai’s eyes as the sales started picking up.

Recovered and healthy watermelon crop

Jayeshbhai ended up earning INR 4,00,000 by selling his produce himself. This was significantly more than the results experienced by other farmers in his village and a first for Jayeshbhai as well.

Sambhaji’s constant encouragement, care, and advice deeply touched Jayeshbhai and this relationship further continued with Prayagbhai who took over from Sambhaji as the primary advisor.

Sambhaji and Prayagbhai at Jayeshbhai's field

On their first field visit post the lockdown, Sambhaji and Prayag decided to visit Jayeshbhai’s village and meet him in person. Jayeshbhai was elated to know about Sambhaji and Prayag’s visit and cancelled his plans of going for a wedding. Upon arriving, they were welcomed by Jayeshbhai’s 76-year-old mother in their humble kaccha makaan. As a token of gratitude, Jayeshbhai offered them his entire produce as a gift. Sambhaji and Prayag ended up spending the day with him and were deeply overwhelmed by this gesture and with the hospitality they received. After spending a couple of hours, despite refusing, Jayeshbhai saw them off with a pair of clothes as a gift for each one of them.

Sambhaji and Prayagbhai receiving a gift bag from Jayeshbhai

On their way back from the visit, Sambhaji got a call from Jayeshbhai asking whether they liked the gift. Sambhaji replied affirmatively and thanked him again. Jayeshbhai insisted that Sambhaji and Prayag open the gift. The duo opened the gift in the car and to their surprise, they found cash of ₹5,000 in total placed between the clothes. The cash gift hidden under the clothes

Sambhaji and Prayag decided to take a U-turn to return the money to the farmer, only to be requested not to do so. The very reason why the farmer put the cash between the clothes was so that Sambhaji and Prayag could not return it to him.

As Sambhaji and Prayag ended the call speechless by the gesture of the farmer what created a deep impact on them that day was the fact that a farmer who lived such an austere life, for whom Rs. 5000 was a huge amount, he gladly gave it as a gift to Prayag and Sambhaji. Even offering his entire harvest as a gift, made Prayag and Sambhaji realise the importance of our mission of #HelpingFarmersWin and the impact it creates on the lives of farmers.

Such is the power of #WorkingForImpact and real impact like this is all that we need to continue working for impact with more vigour.