Lakhpati Kisan Initiative

The Central India Initiative, one of the flagship initiatives of Tata Trusts, focuses on the tribal belts in central India. It strives to bring households out of poverty irreversibly with increased life choices. To propel this mission, Collectives for Integrated Livelihood Initiatives (CInI), an associate organisation of the Trusts, promotes various livelihood prototypes in agriculture, livestock and non-timber forest produce, and water resource development.

In 2015, the Trusts launched the ‘Mission 2020 – Lakhpati Kisan: Smart Villages’ through CInI. A Lakhpati Kisan is one who earns over Rs100,000 per annum. The programme engages with more than 100,000 households in 13 districts across four states – Jharkhand, Odisha, Maharashtra and Gujarat. The objective was to bring about irreversible change in the central Indian tribal belt through economic empowerment and improving the quality of life of tribal communities.

Key achievements till December 2023
  • Touched nearly 110,000 tribal households of the Central Indian belt.
  • Creation of more than 45,000 Lakhpati Kisan tribal families through accelerated income growth, and within a five to six years’ timeframe.
  • Community-based institutions strengthened through capacity building and leadership-building strategies.
  • Introduction of technology-led changes, including sustainable energy solutions such as solar pumps, insect traps, cold storages, drip with mulching, development of the Lakhpati Kisan App and SMC App, use of GIS mapping for cultivated areas, introduction of IT in education, piloting app-based data entry, etc.
  • Layering of multi-sector interventions such as education, water, sanitation and hygiene, along with ongoing livelihood activities for 20,000 households, thereby holistically improving quality of life.
  • Creation of more than 60 market-linked production clusters with focused value chain development. More than 250 rural tribal entrepreneurs were trained in aspects such as drip irrigation with mulching for open field precision farming, commercial soil-less nurseries, farm mechanisation, brood lac provider, livestock feed management, etc.
  • Creation of more than 2,540 irrigation structures, thereby bringing 15,000 acres under irrigation and ensuring year-round agricultural water for 40,000 households.
Future plans

Over the next 10 years, CInI hopes to reach one million households and develop 100 blocks as drivers of regional growth. The initiative also hopes to:

  • Encourage apex community-based institutions to take ownership of the entire programme, including planning, implementation, reporting, monitoring, etc.
  • Upscale the Lakhpati Kisan model towards state saturation, to be achieved through partnerships with other stakeholders, such as the government, community, donors and other organisations.
  • Influence design and development of large-scale programmes in the development sector and government initiatives through proactive engagement, based on learnings from the successes of the ‘Lakhpati Kisan’ model.
Areas of operation

Jharkhand, Odisha, Maharashtra, Gujarat

The Lakhpati Kisan: Smart Villages programme model was replicated in other states like Rajasthan and Uttarakhand.

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