Eight Months of Land, Labour and Money, Before the First Answer

The interesting number in this record is not the return. It is the cost she carried for 241 days.

Kaushalya planted desi Sugandha turmeric on 0.8 acre on 17 May 2025 and harvested on 12 January 2026 - a 241-day cycle.

Her trial sheet makes the economics visible instead of collapsing them into a claim of success. Eight quintals of seed at ₹16,000. Land rent ₹32,000. Land preparation and cow dung at ₹4,000 each. Irrigation ₹800. Planting labour ₹1,200. Three trolley-loads of sugarcane-leaf mulch at ₹6,000, plus digging, cutting and transport. Total input cost ₹78,500.

Ninety quintals of turmeric. Income ₹1,71,000. Net return ₹92,500.

Her conclusion is practical rather than promotional: in her experience turmeric returned three to four times what paddy and wheat did, and suits a farmer looking for a higher-value option.

The change is not only the income. She now holds a complete production cycle she can interrogate - planting date, mulch, labour, harvest, costs, returns. That is what she needs to decide whether to repeat it, change the area, or hand the method to other members of the Aarti Aajeevika Adhikar Sangathan.

Facilitation here means documentation. She took the risk and did the work; what the programme added was turning one farmer’s experience into evidence that can travel to the next farm.

Next season will test it. Turmeric prices, seed costs, land rent, storage and processing all move. How much was sold, at what price, and whether any was kept back as seed are the things worth recording.

The interesting number is the cost she carried for 241 days.