Rice in Orissa - Life in Orissa
Rice in Orissa - Life
in Orissa
Jagannath Chatterjee, Living
Farms, Bhubaneswar
History of rice in
Orissa:
Rice
has been the principal food crop of Orissa much before the 14th
century AD. When Wang-Ta-Yuan, the Chinese writer of the 14th
century visited the State it was being grown in abundance. Other historical
texts, like the Manasollasa of Somesvara and the Mahabharata of Sarala Das, too
point out that paddy cultivation was the mainstay of the people of this region
which was endowed with fertile land and had plenty of rivers running through
it. Wild rice, it is known, was tamed by the tribals inhabiting the Jeypore
tract of Orissa which is considered to be one of the secondary centers of
origin of rice.
The
similarity between the name Orissa and the Greek name for rice “Oryza” has led many to speculate that
the name of the State derives its name from the crop known as Oryza Sativa.
Culture and
festivities:
This
may be speculation; historians say the term “Odra Desha” meaning land of cultivators, led to the state being
named Odisha anglicized as Orissa, but
with such a long history of association with this food crop it is no wonder
that much of the culture of this land is woven around this crop. Proof of this
is evident even today as paddy as well as rice, the finished product, forms an
integral part of all rituals of Orissa. It is offered to Gods in various forms,
both in grain as well as various rice preparations and cakes, and is also
crushed to form a paste that is used to paint various designs that decorate
places of worship, an art form called the jhoti.
Besides
the crop and its first sowing, the transplanting, the fertile soil “mother”,
the plough, the cattle, the reaping, the offering to Gods, separation of the
grain, consumption, keeping apart as seed, storing, and even the trade of rice
was occasion of celebration. Orissa is the only state in the world that
believes that the “earth mother” menstruates and there is no ploughing in those
days celebrated as the festival “Raja”.
Rice is associated with prosperity and the name “dhana” in Orissa signifies both the crop as well as wealth. It
represents Goddess Lakshmi, the harbinger of wealth and prosperity, and is also
used to invoke her. Lord Baladeva, elder brother of Lord Jagannath, symbolizes
the plough. The various hand made and woven articles used in such worship
resulted in a flourishing artisan trade. Musical instruments were played by specialized
artistes, while the Brahmins, imported from Kanauja into Orissa, performed the
rituals.
Sri
Ratnakar Sahu, an organic farmer from Patnagarh in Bolangir district, laments
that rituals have become distorted and have lost their true relevance because
the varieties of rice that were central to many of them have become extinct.
Nowadays people offer any kind of rice without understanding why any particular
variety was recommended, he says. It could have been that, as rice offerings
were partaken by all after being offered as part of the rituals, they had a
beneficial effect on health when consumed at that particular time of the year.
The
farmers of Orissa both worshipped and loved the crop and never failed to
improve on it. This practice to continuously improve and adapt led to the
enormous diversity of rice varieties observed in Orissa since ancient times.
Reasons behind varietal
selection and diversification:
Seed
selection was based not just on yield
but also on such other criteria as food
habit; puffed rice, puffed paddy, beaten rice, beverage rice, rice cakes, rice
pudding, sweets, rice milk, stale rice in water, are some of the favourite rice
preparations of the Oriya’s; for ritualistic
use, a variety of black rice, kalakrushna,
was partaken while mourning for the dead
perhaps for its anti depressant qualities, certain varieties are grown purely
for festive use and are used as offerings to God called “bhoga”; length of the stem,
long stem ensures the rice survives a flood and the hay can be used for
thatched houses as well as cow fodder; time
taken to yield; draught resistance,
a variety called Sarai can grow even
in scanty rainfall.
Rice
was also selected and cultivated for medicinal value; malnutrition, asthma,
arthritis, nutrition for the mother while weaning, indigestion, acidity and
jaundice are conditions some native rice varieties of Orissa can help fight
against; aroma, certain rice
varieties of Orissa can compare with the famous Basmati for its scent and
taste; resistance to pests and disease;
resistance to salinity; size of the grains, small grained rice
does not break but long grained rice fetches more price in the market; size of the panicles; large panicles
mean more grain per panicle, colour;
taste; keeping qualities; and nutritional
values.
As
agriculture scientists have observed even the colour of the leaves excited the farmers; a wild variety found in
the Jeypore tract O. perennis is
purple pigmented. Rice chaff was
also used to fill up gaps in the famous Jagannath Temple
Rice
in Orissa is even known for the way it
is stored. A particular variety of rice in South
Orissa is stored in underground pits. The rice matures in the heat
of the earth and does not cause discomfort to people who have the preference
for raw rice but cannot digest it. This rice takes very little time to cook,
just as raw rice, but tastes like boiled rice. It is known in local parlance as
“Khani paka chaula” or “mined rice”.
Diverse land types and
ecosystems:
Orissa,
a state bordering the Indian Ocean and home to
many a meandering river consists of four different ecosystems, irrigated low
land, rain fed low land, deep water and flood prone land as well as up land. It
is indicative of the skills mastered by the cultivators that rice was
cultivated widely in all the ecosystems. Intense breeding and careful selection
ensured that farmers were able to innovate and introduce varieties that had the
desired qualities and which flowered and expressed themselves even under adverse
circumstances.
Import of varieties:
Thanks
to the maritime skills of the Oriya’s, the locals traveled by indigenously
built decorated wooden ships called boita’s
to far off Burma, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. The rulers of Orissa repeatedly
forayed down south, and also east, during their expeditions. It is during the
course of such business and plundering that popular variety of rice from those
lands may have been imported into the state to be later acclimatized and
adapted as per local conditions. The important varieties from the neighbouring
state of then undivided Bengal , home to rice eaters
too may have enriched the lands of the farmers of Orissa. Being in the
possession of exquisite varieties was a source of pride for the farmer as it
alleviated his position in the society. Farmers often exchanged seeds just as
coin collectors exchange rare coins.
Wild varieties:
Besides
these cultivated varieties, wild varieties are found in the Jeypore tract,
where the initial survey in the early decades of the 20th century
had recorded 150 varieties, and also the Bhitarkanika coastal area where a wild
variety grows abundantly in tidal mud flats based upon which many flood and
salinity resistant varieties have been developed. The forest farmers of
Mayurbhanj district in Orissa have helped identify many a wild variety growing
in their forests. They grow a variety called Kadalikandi which is a
180 day variety. Wild varieties are
essential to improve upon cultivars and also to seek solutions for various
strange diseases and pests the rice crop may suddenly succumb to.
The diversity in rice:
It
is thus no wonder that Orissa once had 50,000 recorded varieties of rice. The
actual number could have been more than 1,00,000 as record keeping was never
the farmers forte. The Kings too were fond of rice varieties as rice is an
important part of the Mahaprasad that is offered to Lord Jagannath every day.
Even today there are huge stretches of land across Orissa that grow rice for
the daily offering to the deity. The temple records, the Madala Panji, speak of many exquisite varieties that were regularly
offered to the Lord; records that indicate a deep understanding and intimate
knowledge of the then prevalent rice varieties. Myths describe how the Supreme
Deity has on many occasions gone in a human form to the house of devotees to
feed them offered rice with his own hand.
Rice, preferred by
Gods:
Lord
Krishna is fond of rice pudding, called “Kheeri”
in Oriya. There is a temple devoted to Lord Krishna in Kendrapada district of
Orissa. A Vaishnav saint of repute
was once passing through on his way to Puri. He was hungry and asked the temple
priest for Prasad. The priest was
apologetic as all the Prasad, mud
pots containing Kheeri, had already
been distributed amongst devotees. The distraught saint lay under a tree and
was sad that Krishna had denied him food that
night. As he slept the Lord appeared to him in his dream and requested him to
go to the priest once again and ask for Prasad.
The saint dared not go against the Lord and awakened the priest. The amazed
priest opened the temple and searched. He was surprised to find a pot of Kheeri that was hidden under the skirt
of the deity. From that day onwards Krishna of that temple came to be known as
“Kheera Chora Gopinath” or the Krishna who stole rice pudding for his devotee!
Rice fields as
learning institutions:
Besides
uplifting the individual and society spiritually, the rice fields were learning
experiences for the entire family. Families that worked together sung various
folk songs; breastfeeding mothers put to sleep their babies singing lullabies
of nature, and the elements that link us to the entire natural system was
conveyed and taught to the next generation. Farmers honed their skills in this
hoary land and passed them on to their progeny. Ratnakar Sahu, a senior sage
like and prominent organic farmer of Orissa who is so deeply entrenched in
nature that poisonous snakes live as pets in his home, laments that with the
rice culture fast disappearing people have become materialistic and can no
longer enjoy the thrill of being a part of ones natural surroundings.
Sri
Ratnakar Sahu sums up what he has learnt from the fields. He is today able to
define the seven friends and the seven enemies of the farmer. The seven friends
are the earth who is the mother, the cow the caretaker, the tree the life
force, the water which symbolizes courage, the seed his capital, his friends
and co farmers, the earthworm, micro organisms, birds, bees and the animals,
whereas his strength was the farm labourers.
On
the other hand the seven enemies of the farmer are loans, artificial
fertilisers, chemical pesticides, hybrid seeds or GM seeds, wish for a luxurious
life, laziness, and depletion of natural resources.
Memories haunt:
What
he says is evident to everyone today. Though living in modern cities, the Oriya
is at heart still a villager and misses the familiar scents of fresh hay,
boiling paddy, floating chaff and the peculiar strong odours from cattle sheds
that once charmed him and soothed his nerves. It pains them that such a life,
and the cultures and festivities associated with it, is gone forever and will
not return as their children are selling ancestral property and buying
apartments in multistoried buildings sprouting in the cities.
Cities too are
affected:
It
is not that the cities are shielded from the effects of reduced interest in the
cultivation of rice. The city of Bhubaneswar
Hoping against hope:
Even
today, says Natabara Sarangi a farmer who conserves more than 300 varities of
rice in his farm, one can get more than 5000 traditional varieties in Orissa if
one has the patience to trace them. The Jeypore tract alone has yielded 1745 up
land varieties in the survey mentioned earlier.
It
is tragic that such a huge diversity will soon be a thing of the past. High
yielding varieties have replaced the once popular traditional varieties. Noted
only for yield these laboratory bred rice varieties produce bland rice just for
filling the belly. The variety of taste that the people of Orissa enjoyed has
now been replaced by the tasteless mass that passes by the name of rice today.
Last year a group of journalists had visited a remote place in coastal Orissa
to record the movement of turtles that had surfaced to lay eggs on the beaches.
Hungry, they could only trace a farmers hut. Says Satya Prakash Naik,
correspondent of Times Now, “All that the farmer could offer to us was some boiled
local rice, but it tasted so wonderful we asked for more!” The farmer had
cooked and served a wild variety of rice found in that area.
Whither Food Security?
Today the cultivation of paddy itself is threatened as
farmers are being encouraged to go in for cash crops. The growth of paddy
cultivation in the state has become almost stagnant. Farmers are dependant on
the market for seeds and the supply is erratic. While the traditional varieties
were pest and disease resistant, the new varieties are notorious for the same.
Farmers of Orissa have now become accustomed to spraying the dreaded pesticide
Endosulphan twice on the crop. With the increase in cost of chemical inputs,
forced down the gullets of farmers who were used to organic cultivation and the
threat of floods and erratic rainfall everywhere farmers are now abandoning
agriculture. Festivals, religious and cultural, that were once vibrant exists
today only as token symbols, their significance forgotten.
Government statistics amply demonstrates how farmers
are being encouraged to move away from food crops. Vast stretches of rice
fields in the districts of Kalahandi, Rayagada, Bolangir, Gajapati, Ganjam,
Sundargarh and Phulbani have today been converted to cotton cultivation.
Floriculture is spreading as is the conversion of food crop land to grow bio
fuels. The farmers who grew rice in their fields have today become dependant on
rice doled out under government schemes. The resultant food shortage is being
politicized to usher in the biotech revolution. The rice farmer, once the pride
of the state, is migrating in search of job. Cultures and festivities have
given way to poverty, hunger and sorrow.
Threat from hybrids,
modern agriculture:
While
hybrid varieties are being introduced upon the assumption that it will feed the
hungry, Orissa is in fact a rice exporting state. It always was, as
Wang-Ta-Yuan recorded, but the scientists have raised the bogey of “inadequacy
of subsistence farming” to do away with indigenous varieties so that the farmer
becomes dependant on the market for seeds. Along with that have disappeared the
scientific skills of both the farmer and his family members who were experts in
choosing, storing and improving upon seeds, rues Natabara Sarangi.
The
traditional varieties required very little care and yet gave high yields. A survey
conducted by the CRRI in Orissa to document traditional rice varieties has
revealed that while high yielding varieties could not tolerate draught
conditions followed by cyclonic storms that led to considerable crop loss in a
particular year in the Mayurbhanj district of Orissa, the native varieties were
not affected.
Mono
cultures have further depleted the diversity of rice. The entire country is
today ruled by a few hundred hybrid varieties against the 2, 00,000 traditional
varieties endowed with several qualities that once adorned it. While once the
taste and type of rice changed from village to village, food aficionados have
become accustomed to the current reign of rice without taste. Orissa is no
exception.
Cheap source of
nutrition:
The
disappearance of many traditional varieties of rice suitable for certain uses has
meant that puffed rice mudhi , beaten
rice chuda , puffed paddy khai, stale rice soaked in water pakhala ; which are the cheap food
available to all sections of the population in Orissa and have sustained them
for centuries, do not have the necessary nutrients to sustain them. Rice milk, torani, and even the left over water
after boiling rice, peja, have been
sources of nutrition and medicine for many an ailment. The polishing of rice in
mills has resulted in the top red nutritious protein and amino acid rich layer
being removed leaving only the carbohydrate containing endosperm behind. No
wonder the state ranks high in the malnutrition index and has a very high rate
of infant and maternal mortality.
Associated losses:
The
short stems of the high yielding varieties have resulted in less hay for cattle
and for compost. The hay is also used for building roofs of mud houses. With
the source of easily available food gone, the farmers can no longer afford to
keep cows. This has led to the loss of yet another good source of nutrition;
milk. Cow dung also served as fuel and an antiseptic when mixed with cow urine
and water it was used to wipe the mud floors of houses. Cow dung fed fires used
to keep the mosquitoes at bay and perhaps also the dreaded disease malaria that
is currently taking a heavy toll in the state. Keeping cows has always been a
way of life in Orissa but this practice is fast disappearing just as the
traditional rice varieties have disappeared over the years.
Can the glory be
revived?
But
there is still hope. The System of Rice Intensification (SRI), a method that
has received the official nod from the Government of Orissa, and a renewed
interest in organic farming amongst farmers facing the vagaries of the Green
Revolution has once again rekindled the interest in rice. However the farmers
must be provided with traditional varieties to reap the full benefit and make
the process sustainable. Farmers owing their allegiance to various religious
institutions are being encouraged to adopt organic practices so as to respect
life and the ecosystem. The renewed interest in ayurveda coupled with health
consciousness is ensuring an observable shift in agriculture practices. But the
dominance of the market has made rice conservation, once the hallmark of a good
farmer and a source of pride, a thing of the past.
Conservation
Activities:
Conservation
of native varities by farmers of the state is yet to be properly recorded and
documented. Besides Natabara Sarangi, a retired school teacher who turned to
farming as a post retirement activity and converted to organic farming after
observing the adverse effects of chemical pesticides, who has taken up the
arduous task of conserving 200 varieties, Siba Prasad Sahu of Gaisilat Block in
Bargarh district is spearheading another movement involving 300 farmers of the
region who are collectively conserving 70 varieties of rice, including various
medicinal varieties. He is keen to hold a rice festival to highlight this
achievement and bring more farmers into the fold.
Sri
D. Narayan of Ganjam district is another organic farmer who is conserving five
varieties including a medicinal variety called Karani which is capable of curing digestive problems including
acidity. He is also conserving and cultivating a local variety called Boudiahunda that is in demand for being
used for puffed rice mudhi. Another
variety has been brought in from Chhattisgarh which has 15% protein content confirmed
through laboratory tests. Conservation activities of a few varieties are also
being done in Beguniapada Block as per Sri Simanchal Nayak, a farmer leader.
Sri
Ratnakar Sahu of Patnagarh, Bolangir, is conserving certain varieties of rice.
He is in search of certain varieties which were available in Orissa and which
can still be traced. They are the Karni,
a medicinal variety farmers used to treat the body pain of the farmer and his
cattle after ploughing, a very fine tasty variety called the Jonyjari, another scented variety called
the Hubri Mahaharaj, a variety called
Gidan, which is perfect for beaten
rice and a variety earlier found in Khariar of Nuapada district that served as
a medicine for certain form of heart ailments.
Recently
at a national level rice breeder meet held at Bhubaneswar ,
where rice breeders from South and East India
converged, the need was felt for like minded farmers from across the country to
work in tandem and give a fillip to enterprising farmers who want to take back
the control of rice seeds.
People
like Natabara Sarangi of Nariso, Siba Prasad Sahu of Bargarh, Narayan Reddy of
Ganjam, Ratnakar Sahu of Patnagarh, Gopal Chandra Khuntia of Nayagarh, a farmer
who has for many years now fully converted to organic practices, and a few other
enterprising organic farmers who have courageously and stubbornly swum against
the tide must be made examples for others to follow.
Rice is life:
Rice
is not just food for Orissa, it is life itself. It is a complete knowledge base
that was intricately woven around nature. The people’s happiness merged with it
and raised the level a few notches. The rice fields were knowledge reservoirs
and were a much more complex system than the current age practices of linear
thinking and monocultures. This knowledge base that involved the knowledge of
the weather, type of soil, type of land, and other elements of the ecosystem
led to minimum intervention farming that suited all life forms which were
associated with it. This knowledge has to be regenerated. The glory once
associated with the cultivation of rice must be revived to inject life and
energy into the fast depleting agricultural creativity and endeavour of the
farmers of the State.
Say
Yes to Rice, Say Yes to Life.
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