Zaid Farming Challenges India Climate Water Soil [2021] May 2026

The old well, dug by his grandfather in 1982, now gave only a muddy trickle by March. Zaid used to grow two crops: cotton in the kharif (monsoon) and wheat in the rabi (winter). But the groundwater table had dropped so low that the electric pump now sucked air for half the day. His neighbor, old Ramesh Kaka, had sold his buffaloes and left for Pune to drive a rickshaw. “No water, no crop, Zaid,” he’d said. “The climate has changed its contract with us.”

That year, the money lender did not take his pots. And Fatima smiled when Zaid brought home a single pomegranate from the tree he’d planted near the kund —sweet, red, and impossibly alive. zaid farming challenges india climate water soil

When the next monsoon failed, Zaid’s neighbors laughed at his “jungle farm.” But after a single heavy downpour of 50mm, while their fields ran brown with runoff, Zaid’s kunds held water for three more weeks. His mulched soil stayed damp. His pigeon peas, though stunted, produced enough grain for his family’s dal . The old well, dug by his grandfather in