All through the years that Capt Shrauti tilled the land there was one distinct feature that dominated his mind, and indeed the minds of all farmers in the area. This is the paucity of the land. All farmers suffer the paucity of the land in this area. This relates to lack of resources like water – not that there is not enough ground water –there is plenty of it, but no electricity to pump the water up to feed the crops.
The land in the Hessargatta area is naturally very fertile land. It is home to the Indian Institute of Horticultural Research, who use this rich land for a variety of research projects. Hessargatta is also home to the Central Poultry Development institute, the Indo Danish Breeding institute, etc., and all these institutes depend on the fertile soil to grow feed for the animals.
But in spite of this abundance from nature the farmer could not grow crops. Capt Shrauti has lost crops multiple times because he did not have enough water to feed his crops. The reason again – no electricity to pump the water.
So while nature has been kind to the area giving it fertile soil, lots of underground water, adequate rainfall through the year, somewhere down the line, the farmer lost his capability to till the soil using nature and instead became dependent on resources like bore well pump sets, pesticides, fertilisers etc.
The traditional farmer has also lost all his traditional skills to survive. In the days where there was not electricity, the farmer still tilled the land, but also had skills to harness nature to help in agriculture. They knew how to harvest rain water, store it and use it when it was needed. The days when organic farming was the norm, the farmer knew how to keep pests at bay and nurture a bountiful crop. He did not know pesticides and fertilisers like the way we do now. But all this has been lost and the farmer has become a slave to ‘modern’ technology.
One can witness some heart wrenching scenes when one visits the village mandis (markets) in the mornings when farmers bring their produce to sell to traders. On one such occasion, the founder of Our Native Village, C B Ramkumar was visiting the mandi to sell a sack of bitter gourd to the market. All sales are done using the auctioning method. After much waiting the sack of bitter gourd was sold for Rs 80 – which seemed ridiculous – just the diesel cost for the trip to the mandi was more than Rs 80!
After this sale, Ram noticed an elderly couple, in their 70’s, waiting to sell three lots of 3 to 4 pumpkins in each lot. The auction started and two lots were sold for Rs 30 and Rs 20 respectively. The auctioneer, out of pity, agreed to take the 3rd lot also for Rs 30. That morning this couple went back to their village with Rs 80 with them. They had walked more than 6 km’s to come to the mandi and were now walking back with this paltry sum that should last them for at least the next 2 to 3 weeks.
This couple could grow only pumpkins because again they had no water. They had bore well pumps but no electricity to pump the water up to water their crops!
Mankind had managed to put a man on the moon, but here we are still unable to provide a farmer means to water his crops to produce food!! Something is wrong with us and our priority is what Ram thought.
He dreamed up a vision to develop a self sustaining living model that could be replicated across the rural and urban landscape.

This is the entrance to Our Native Village

Our Native Village is the first manifestation of this dream. The first 100% eco retreat, where all 5 pillars of sustainability – energy, water, waste, architecture and the food chain – are addressed using robust sustainable technologies. The hospitality sector is an unforgiving sector with very high standards of service in India. The thinking was that if we can successfully develop a model for the hospitality sector, then this can be more easily replicated across other sectors.
Our Native Village was born with this dream.