A hundred litchi trees, 300 mahogany trees, and 900 mango trees – this was the landscape across a 36-acre plot in Bichara village, Jharkhand, back in 2020. The land had been leased by 43-year-old farmer Chaitanya Kumar Ganjhu, who was determined to build something lasting.

Every inch of the land was carefully revived to create a thriving orchard. But just three years later, even before the trees had matured, a fire reduced everything to ashes. To this day, Ganjhu does not know who set the blaze.

Heartbroken, he could not even claim insurance because no police official was willing to register a complaint.

"I didn't have insurance or any supporting document to establish my claim, and I returned home empty-handed," Ganjhu tells The Better India.

His farming journey had begun much earlier. In 2015, he had planned to start a lac farm, but limited resources forced him to change course. Instead, he began planting host trees, including 1,200 Indian jujube trees, only to lose them all in the devastating fire.

Spineless cactus showed the way

Looking back, Ganjhu now calls the fire a turning point.

The tragedy left behind a vast stretch of empty land, forcing him to rethink what he could grow next. While exploring new opportunities in 2024, he learnt about central and state government efforts to promote cactus cultivation. Curious, he reached out to an engineer friend, who suggested that spineless cactus could be worth exploring.

"I was excited because cactus farming was completely new to me. During my research, I discovered that natural leather can also be produced using Opuntia ficus-indica, a spineless cactus variety. Our native cactus has thorns, but this one doesn't," he says.

Determined to learn more, Ganjhu spent weeks researching online before connecting with the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA).

He saw cactus as more than an experimental crop. Unlike lac farming, which generates income only twice a year, cactus offered the possibility of a steadier source of earnings. Encouraged by the government's support for the crop, he contacted ICARDA's centre in Amlaha, Madhya Pradesh, to understand how to begin.

What impressed him most was its resilience.

Spineless cactus requires very little water, stays green even through harsh summers, and grows well in poor soils. Because it has no thorns, it can also be used as nutritious fodder for livestock.

Confident that the crop had potential, Ganjhu purchased 10,000 cactus cladodes from ICARDA at Rs 10 each. In November 2024, he planted them across 2.5 acres of land at Gamhariya Jaltanda, becoming the first farmer in Jharkhand to cultivate spineless cactus on this scale.

Today, his nursery has the capacity to produce nearly two lakh cactus plants every year. He currently grows 25 varieties.

Among them, varieties such as Oretha de Elefante Africana, IPA-90-73, Copena V1, Mexica Folder-1278 and Additional-1258, sourced from Brazil, have performed particularly well. Each produces around 10 cladodes annually, compared to two or three from many of the other varieties. The slower-growing varieties, he says, are better suited for research than commercial cultivation.

Water for irrigation comes from a solar-powered borewell. During summer, the plants are watered every five to six days because of the poor soil quality. In cooler months, watering once every 15 days is usually enough. Cow dung manure is applied twice a year.

"Ganjhu is the only farmer to develop a cactus nursery in India. ICARDA introduced this technique and trained district-level officers and officials from the Watershed Development Department, but only Ganjhu took the initiative. Today, he is successfully growing healthy, disease-free spineless........

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