Community Farm - Green Souls - Kharghar

Jointly growing

Green Souls have put forth a fine example of community farming in Kharghar, says Shilpa Sachdev


A group of avid urban gardeners have come together to set up a community farm in Kharghar. Located within the premises of Tata Hospital, the farm was initiated in June 2011 with the support of St Jude's Shelter Home. Within a span of six months, Green Souls - the group that manages the show - has put together a successful model of urban farming. They have seen a good harvest and plan to scale up the activities.




Talking about the early days, Julius Rego, one of the front-runners from Green Souls says, "We got connected through a common friend and Taiba, who works at St Jude's, offered us to develop an urban farm behind the premises of the centre. The raw material was lying in front of us. We started collecting leaves and twigs to make beds for planting the seeds and saplings."

Bhindi, Corn, Chavli were planted along with a flowering plant to create cross-pollination. Julius adds, "We also planted different herbs like Italian basil, ajwain, spearmint, pudina and Sri Lanka palak. These strong smelling plants help in distracting insects and pests."

The group managed to reap an excellent crop for the monsoon. This gave them the encouragement to drive the momentum further. "Within two months, we harvested an abundant crop. Then we created an official group and started to expand. Although the parents and the staff help with watering and overall care but for doing more work, we require more hands," shares Julius.


The Group held its first workshop on "Basics of Growing Your Own Food" towards the end of December. The idea was to get more people to participate and to do that, the Group stationed themselves outside the Central Park to inform people about the workshop. "We had a turnout of 15 people and the majority of the attendees who came for the workshop were the people we chatted up with outside the Central Park, "Julius points out. The workshop explained the people how to do gardening with hands-on experience. "We taught them to make raised beds and plant the saplings with minimum requirement. We taught them to recycle and reuse available resources. Our target is to hold at least one workshop every month."

According to another volunteer Sabita Rajendran, the larger objective of the group is to build a community initiative around urban farming. She says, "People have become so disconnected with nature and especially the food that they are eating. We are targeting children and societies to come in support of urban farming and encourage a dialogue on the subject. In doing so, we also ensure we keep things simple."

Julius adds, "Also, with the cost of food going up and to save ourselves from genetically modified food that is impacting our health, we need to build alternatives like urban gardening that will at least take care of the needs of a small group. Today we are in a situation where food crops are being substituted with cash crops, land fertility is on the decline and diseases are on the rise. We must replenish our land and ensure the food we eat is naturally grown and rich in nutrients."


At St Jude's, the farm activities are slowly taking a leap. While radish and basil is ample, there is also palak and chavli growing abundantly. New saplings for brinjal have been recently planted. Even pineapples and potatoes have been planted. The group is slowly expanding as many volunteers from different walks of life have joined the fray. They ensure they at least meet twice in a week and the agenda is decided week on week. Sabita says, "Some of the regular activities we do are plant new saplings, mulch the existing ones and water them from time to time. The produce has to be protected and harvested. New beds have to be made. We also devise new ideas to make it more interesting and fun. It is an ongoing thing and there is a lot of work to be done."

For those who wish to volunteer with Green Souls, they can freely walk in to the farm. They also conduct workshops that provide a guided approach to anybody who is interested in creating their own urban garden. 

On a broader perspective, urban farming has become more relevant today and we can start with it right inside our own homes by simply recycling and reusing the resources freely available at our disposal.

published in Times Property on Jan 19, 2013