Nashik grape farmers’ hopes are gone with the rains

Last October, Kailas Pingle, a grape farmer from Matori village near Nashik, started working on his five-acre plot, raising grapes. Pingle has been a grape farmer for many years, and took a loan and developed a new vineyard two years ago.

This year, the crop looked good, an export deal was set and harvesting had begun. But on Sunday, despite the holiday and because it had drizzled a day earlier, Kailas and his brothers thought it better to take the day off and continue harvesting the next day.

At 3.30 pm on March 15, it drizzled and the wind began to blow. “It was like a mud storm,” recollects Kailas, “followed by thunder and lighting. Then a hailstorm broke out and the vineyard collapsed. The wind was aggressive, it uprooted the iron angles on which
the vineyard stood and like a pack of cards, a fully laden
vineyard was brought to the ground. My crop was flattened,” narrates Kailas, eyes brimming with tears.

The next morning, 150 farm labourers were brought in to pick up the pieces. With the help of bamboos, the fallen vineyard was raised to a tilted position. All that was fallen was collected in crates and sorted, but now there are no buyers. The market agents saw the damaged fruit and turned their backs.

This is not only Kailas’s story, but the story of many others in this region of Nashik who lost their vineyards to the hailstorm at the time of the harvest. For many others, whose vineyards are upright, the bunches have been so badly damaged that there is hardly any hope of income from the fruit.

“Many times, we feel there is no point in agriculture, but we are farmers and what else can we do? If we take other crops, they don’t suffice to repay loans, pay for the education of our children and get our girls married. We have to keep on gambling with the grape crop,” says Dattu, who is facing a similar loss.