Union Minister for Agriculture Shivraj Singh Chouhan underlined how southern rivers were tree-fed, unlike the northern rivers and called for a sustained campaign to protect them.
Speaking at a seminar on sustainable agricultural practices through tree-based agriculture, organised under the Cauvery Calling campaign of the Isha Foundation at Adhiyaman College of Engineering on Saturday (December 27, 2025), he said the Cauvery Calling initiative was impactful in promoting “tree-based agriculture”. He also took a dig at the Forest Department, dubbing the “Ranger as Danger” and claimed that once a terrain remained as a forest, agriculture was made impossible.
Isha Yoga founder Jaggi Vasudev said that farming is becoming increasingly unsustainable because of the poor quality of soil and fading rivers and made a case of cash generating “high-value” trees such as Sandal and Red Sanders for cultivation by farmers, and allowing for them to monetise these trees without the encumbrances of the law. He also urged the Union Minister to “liberate farming from Government control and British era laws” that forbade farmers from “chopping off trees grown on their lands”.
Making a case for tree-based agriculture that focused on monetising the cash rich-trees, he said there was a need to differentiate produce grown on agriculture lands and forest lands, and anything grown or any wealth found on farmland must belong to the farmer, (except for civilisational discoveries). “A ranger thinks all trees belong to him, but they must belong to me, when they are grown on my land,” he alleged.
Published – December 27, 2025 07:42 pm IST
