Originally reported and written in March 2023, this story has been republished as part of our archival content.

In 2016, engineer Ramesh Biswal was pursuing his post-doctoral studies in material science in the US. Around the same time, continents away, India was reeling from the horrific news of mass farmer suicides. 

A National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) report years later would suggest that that year, as many 11,379 farmers took their own lives. The reasons, the report noted, were many — poor harvest, low selling rates for produce, environmental stressors, and crop failure, which all amounted to massive amounts of debt. 

Ramesh would hear about all this through the news and during calls back home to his family based in Bhubaneshwar, Odisha. The stories left him aghast, and he began to wonder why the issue of farmer suicides was so rampant in India.  

“I began drawing comparisons between the United States and India and came to the conclusion that, from a scientific perspective, the reason the US was more developed than India was that of the bend of mind used in research,” the IIT-Kharagpur graduate tells The Better India. “In the US, research is intended to solve societal problems, whereas in India, once the publication is out, the research is left forgotten.” 

But there was another reason why the news of farmer suicides struck a chord with Ramesh. 

“My father, too, is a farmer, and I have grown up watching how hard farmers work in order to make ends meet. So, to hear of the farmer suicides was heartbreaking and felt personal. I decided to use my degree and knowledge for my homeland, and returned to India in 2016.” 

In the months that followed, Ramesh began building a community of friends from his village, who he says shared a common desire to do something good and put an end to these burdening issues in rural........

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