We explain what government schemes exist, what agricultural research actually says, and how farming can be run as a business. Free to read. Nothing to sign up for.
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About
What Krishi Saathi is
Krishi Saathi exists to help farmers understand modern agricultural knowledge and think like businessmen — not just cultivators. We teach what schemes exist, what research says, and how farming can be run as a business.
How we work
We research from official sources
Scheme details come from government portals and published notifications. Research summaries come from bodies like ICAR, recognised Indian institutions and foreign agricultural research agencies. Nothing is scraped or auto-generated.
We check before we publish
Every entry is read and verified by a person before it goes on the site. Each scheme carries the date it was last checked, so you can see how fresh it is.
We explain in plain language
Scheme documents are written for departments, not for farmers. We rewrite them into everyday language and organise them by the problem you are trying to solve.
We send you to the official source
Applications happen on government portals, never here. Every scheme links out to the official page so you apply in the right place.
Government schemes
Organised by your problem, not by department
Government schemes are usually listed by the ministry that runs them. That is useless if what you actually need is a loan, or a way to store your harvest. So we sorted them by the problem instead.
Covering Chhattisgarh state schemes and central government schemes. We are expanding to other states over time.
"We'll help you apply"
Planned — not available
A guided application-help service is something we want to build. It does not exist yet, and nothing here is active. We are showing this so you know what is planned — not to suggest it is available.
Modern research
What the research actually says
Short, plain-language summaries of agricultural research — from ICAR and other Indian institutions, and from agricultural research bodies abroad. Each one links to the original so you can read it in full.
Direct-seeded rice can cut water and labour — with weeds as the catch
Instead of raising a nursery and transplanting seedlings into puddled, flooded fields, direct-seeded rice sows seed straight into the field. Research from Indian and international rice institutes consistently finds large savings in irrigation water and in the labour that transplanting demands, with yields comparable to transplanted rice when the crop is managed well. The consistent catch is weeds: without standing water suppressing them, weed pressure rises sharply, and trials where DSR underperforms usually trace back to weed control rather than to the sowing method itself.
Why it matters
In a rice state like Chhattisgarh, water and transplanting labour are two of the largest costs in the season. This is one of the few changes that reduces both at once — but only if you have a weed plan before you sow.
This is our summary, not the original text. Always check the source for the full finding.
Cropping systems8 Aug 2026
Land left empty after the rice harvest can grow a second pulse crop
Across eastern and central India, a very large area of rice land sits empty after the Kharif harvest because there is no irrigation for a full Rabi crop. Research on rice-fallow systems shows that short-duration pulses such as chickpea, lentil and lathyrus can often be established on the residual moisture left in the soil, using relaxed or zero tillage and sowing immediately after harvest. Yields are modest compared with a fully irrigated crop, but the comparison that matters is against an empty field.
Why it matters
A second crop from land that is currently producing nothing is close to pure addition — and a pulse crop also returns nitrogen to the soil for the next rice season. Timing is everything: the window closes as the residual moisture dries.
This is our summary, not the original text. Always check the source for the full finding.
Soil health5 Aug 2026
Most fertiliser decisions are made by habit, and it costs money
Soil science research in India repeatedly finds the same pattern: nitrogen is over-applied while potassium, sulphur, zinc and boron are under-applied, because farmers follow a familiar dose rather than a test. Applying nitrogen beyond what the crop can use does not raise yield — the surplus is lost to the air and to groundwater — while the nutrient that is actually limiting the crop goes unaddressed. Trials using soil-test-based recommendations commonly report equal or better yields at lower total fertiliser cost.
Why it matters
This is a rare case where spending less and yielding more are the same decision. Government soil testing is free through the Soil Health Card scheme, which makes the test itself cost nothing but the time to arrange it.
This is our summary, not the original text. Always check the source for the full finding.
Farming as a business
The same field, seen as a business
A good harvest and a good year are not the same thing. This section covers the parts of farming that decide whether the season pays: what things cost, when to sell, and how farmers gain bargaining power by organising.
When to sell is a decision. Most farmers never make it.
The price you receive is not one number — it moves through the season, and it moves in a fairly predictable shape. Prices are lowest in the weeks immediately after the main harvest, because everyone is selling at once, and they recover as that supply is absorbed. A farmer who must sell in harvest week is not getting a market price; they are getting the worst price of the year.
Cost-of-cultivation planning
If you do not know your cost per acre, you cannot know if you made money.
Most farming households can state their yield and their sale price precisely, and their total cost only vaguely. That gap is where profit disappears. A cost sheet does not need to be complicated — one page per crop per season, listing what was spent and when, is enough to change decisions. The first year you keep one, it tells you what you spent. Every year after that, it tells you what to change.
Diversification
One crop is one bet placed twice a year.
A household that earns only from a single crop faces the whole year's income on one weather pattern and one price. Diversification — dairy, poultry, goatery, fishery, vegetables, horticulture alongside the main crop — is not primarily about earning more. It is about the timing and independence of income streams: livestock and vegetables pay through the year, in smaller amounts, and their prices do not fall for the same reasons that grain prices fall.
This is knowledge-sharing. Krishi Saathi does not buy, sell, broker or market produce, and does not give investment advice.
Success stories
Farmers who did it, reported by others
These are stories reported by news organisations and government bodies — not our clients, and not our work. We collect them because a real example teaches more than an explanation.
How Dantewada's farmers turned an entire district organic
Under the government's Large Area Certification scheme, more than 10,000 farmers across 110 villages in Dantewada — covering 65,000 hectares — have received organic certification, the first area of its kind in India. Farmers such as Rita Modiyam of Masoodi village now use home-made inputs like jeevamrit instead of chemical fertiliser, and her paddy and vegetable output has grown enough to move her beyond subsistence farming. The certification has not yet brought a price premium in local markets, and current organic output covers only about 40% of district demand — a reminder that a change at this scale takes years to show up fully in farmer incomes.
Charmudiya, ChhattisgarhFarming as a business
She left an MBA career in Pune to run a ₹1.5 crore vegetable farm
Smarika Chandrakar had a computer science degree, an MBA, and five years in corporate business development in Pune before returning to her family's land in Chhattisgarh to farm full-time. Focusing on tomatoes alongside bottle gourd, cucumber and brinjal, her farm reported a turnover of ₹1.5 crore in the 2023-24 financial year and now employs more than 125 people. Her own framing of the decision: farming carries a reputation for being small and unviable that, in her experience, does not hold up.
Lalpur, Bilaspur, ChhattisgarhDiversification
A Class 12-pass farmer earning ₹6–8 lakh a year from lac, not crops
Milan Singh Vishwakarma grew up watching villagers in Bilaspur district collect lac — a resin secreted by insects that live on certain trees — informally. In his early thirties, local forest and agriculture officials introduced him to scientific lac cultivation, and he now manages host trees such as kusum, ber and palash across a 26-acre farm, taking two harvests a year with no synthetic inputs. At around ₹700 a kilogram, lac now brings him ₹6–8 lakh annually — income from a crop most of his neighbours were not farming at all.
Krishi Saathi had no involvement in any outcome described on this page. Each story is credited and linked to its original publisher.
FAQ
Common questions
The questions farmers ask most often. This page is plain text on purpose — it works without JavaScript and it can be found by search engines.
What is Krishi Saathi?
Krishi Saathi is an educational website for farmers. We explain government schemes in plain language, summarise agricultural research, and teach the business side of farming — costs, pricing, selling and organising. Everything on the site is free to read and there is nothing to sign up for.
Is Krishi Saathi a government website?
No. We are a private educational platform and we have no government authority. We explain schemes and link you to the official government portal, but every application, approval and payment happens on the government's own site, not here.
Can you apply for a scheme on my behalf?
No. We do not process applications and we do not submit anything for anyone. Every scheme page links to the official government portal where the application is made. If anyone claims to apply for a scheme on your behalf for a fee using our name, they are not associated with us.
Do I have to pay for anything on this site?
No. Reading the site is free, there is no membership, and we do not sell anything. We also do not ask you to register or to give us your phone number to read anything.
Do you collect my personal information?
We have no login, no registration and no contact form, so we do not collect names, phone numbers or land details. We use Google Analytics to count how many people visit which pages, which sets a cookie in your browser. What you type into the assistant is sent to an AI service to generate an answer — so please do not type Aadhaar numbers, bank details or anything else private into it.
See all questionsHave a different question? Ask the assistant — it answers agriculture questions only.
Contact
Reach us
There is no form here, and we do not collect your details. Message us on WhatsApp or call — whichever is easier.