Seven MBAs who quit jobs to set up profitable farms

The number of working professionals leaving their jobs for the love of farming is increasing by the day. The trend has caught up even more after COVID-19 which led many people back to their native places. Many of them decided not to return and take up farming. 

Then some did not want to be in the 9-to-5 scheme of things for the rest of their lives and left their job to follow their heart.

The advantage of getting an MBA or any other higher qualification is the awareness of both farming and marketing.

It is well known that sales and marketing are the Achilles' Heels for farmers, who depend on middlemen to sell their produce. 

If they take their produce directly to market, they are at the mercy of wholesalers who refuse to buy unless the rate is lowered to the farmer’s disadvantage. If they sell to middlemen, they again get poor rates.

Amid this, MBA farmers are working to create new market channels that bypass both middlemen and mandis. Here are seven enterprising farmers who scripted success stories with their vision and hard work:

1. Smarika Chandrakar, Chhattisgarh

After working for five years in the telecom sector in Pune, Smarika wanted to get back home. Her father and grandfather had been farming in Charmudiya village in Chhattisgarh’s Dhamtari district for almost six decades. And she wanted to work with them.

Smarika, who did her MBA from MIT School of Telecom Management, Pune before completing her engineering from Raipur, quit her job and began farming in 2021. She now grows tomatoes, cucumber and other vegetables in Chhattisgarh. One of the biggest vegetable growers in the state, she harvests 60,000 kg of brinjal and 55,000 kg of tomato per acre and sells veggies in local mandis and other states. 

“We have tie-ups with brokers and decide rates a day before harvesting. The vegetables are then packed and loaded for sale to brokers. Our vegetables go to various places in Bhubaneswar, Patna, Kolkata, Guwahati, Delhi, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Vishakhapatnam,” she says.

Here’s Smarika’s full story: MBA woman farmer harvests 55,000 kg tomatoes per acre; turns around her family farm

2. Chintan Shah, Gujarat

Chintan completed his MBA from Mumbai's prestigious Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies, worked in the corporate sector and quit in 2015 for farming. 

He bought 18 bighas (7.2 hectares) of barren land at Devapura village in Anand, about 65 km from Gujarat’s capital Ahmedabad, after zeroing in on organic farming as a sustainable livelihood option.

He improved its fertility by adding organic manure, vermicompost etc. and now grows turmeric, wheat and ginger. He receives orders through WhatsApp groups and delivers the produce directly to customers at higher-than-market rates. 

Read his story here: Gujarat’s MBA farmer Chintan Shah turns infertile land into organic farm of turmeric, ginger & wheat

3. Amogh S Jagthap, Karnataka

When Amogh S Jagthap was appearing for his MBA final exams in 2016, he would travel from his college in Bengaluru to his home in Mandya near Mysuru almost every second day. His father was a farmer and he enjoyed helping him.

Before long, the MBA decided to join the family farm instead of working 9-to-5 in a corporate setup. He converted his family’s 10-acre infertile land into a natural farm. He also processes farm produce and sells around 100 products including organic vegetables, coconut water, honey, jaggery and other items.

Amogh’s natural farm in Mandya generates an annual profit of around Rs30 lakh. He keeps costs in check by using inputs prepared on the farm and minimising the use of labour. He has set up two farm-to-consumer outlets to sell packaged and fresh farm produce.

Here’s his story: Karnataka’s MBA farmer turns barren land into a profitable natural farm; earns Rs 40 lakh annually

4. Alok Pattnaik, Odisha

Alok completed his MBA from Sambalpur University in Western Odisha in 2002 and last worked with Tata Automotive from where he quit his marketing job in 2018. He now cultivates organic basil (tulsi) in his village in Keonjhar, Odisha. 

Daily, he extracts around seven to eight litres of essential oil, clocking a turnover of over Rs6 lakh per month, and providing employment to tribal people. The oil is bought by pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies. He has now forayed into making basil beads from tulsi oil by-products and temples buy these products.

Here's Alok's detailed story: How this MBA farmer earns Rs6 lakh monthly revenue from basil farming

5. Mandeep Verma, Himachal Pradesh

Mandeep worked with technology giant Wipro at Gurgaon, but wanted to be closer to home so that his children could feel connected to the soil. He quit his corporate job and moved back to Solan in 2014 to be with his parents. 

Mandeep decided to take up organic farming and converted his family’s 4.8 acres of barren land on the outskirts of the village into arable land. Today, Mandeep grows kiwis and apples in Shilli with an annual revenue of about Rs40 lakh. He sells directly from his orchard to customers in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Chandigarh.

His success story: This MBA quit Wipro for organic kiwi farming in Himachal; turns barren land into profitable orchard 

6. Aakash Thakkar, Maharashtra

An MBA in Marketing from Mumbai University, Aakash grows organic fruits, vegetables, grains and pulses on his Thakkar farm in Karjat, 90 km from Mumbai. 

He began with selling organic fruits and vegetables at Mumbai’s weekly farmers’ markets and also home delivering to customers. He would take orders over SMS and phone calls. Aakash’s father converted his old office in Marine Lines into a distribution centre for sorting, grading, packing and dispatching the products to customers.

Apart from his farm, he also sources organic fresh produce, groceries and other products from farmers across India and sells them online under The Farmer brand.

Here’s his story: How Maharashtra’s MBA farmer built an organic food supermarket

7. Katla Srinivas, Telangana

After completing his MBA from the Government City College in Hyderabad, Katla pursued a VFX course and got a job at Red Chillies Entertainment in Mumbai. After working for two years, he quit his job in Mumbai for the love of organic farming in his village in Telangana. 

“From 2014 to 2017, I cultivated bitter gourd, tomato, chillies, bottle gourd and other vegetables and sold them at higher-than-market rates because they were organic. I used only farm manure and vermicompost and organic biofertilizers for the plants,” he says.  

In 2018, he diversified into farming of fig (anjeer in Hindi).  He now gets 100 kg of organic figs (anjeer) daily during the three-month harvest season and sells directly to customers at Rs100 per kg through WhatsApp groups.

Here’s his story: This MBA quit his job to grow organic figs; harvests 4500 kg per acre

(US Anu is a Madurai-based writer. She specialises in stories around human interest, environment and art and culture.)

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