Farmer Chintala Venkat Reddy is one of the Padma Shri awardees announced by the Government of on the eve of 71st Republic Day (yesterday).
Venkat Reddy, who was born in a farmer family in Alwal, was keen about agriculture since adolescence. After completing his college education and quickly entered into farming.
After successfully growing wheat, paddy, maize, bajra, sorghum, pearl millet, sugarcane, vegetables, and other variety of seeds, Chintala became the key contributor to the National Seed Corporation (NSC) as well as the Andhra Pradesh State Seed Development Corporation (APSSDC) for almost ten years.
He has a grape farm at Kundanpally in Keesara & an agriculture research farm in Alwal, where he cultivates rice, wheat, black grapes and vegetables. He also has many grape farmers following his advice and suggestions for the better management of diseases, pest attacks, soil health, pruning, training of young grape plants and drip irrigation etc.
It is important to mention that Chintala was among the first in the city to combine modern & indigenous practices that were born from his own ideas & experiences. He is the one to introduce drip irrigation, organic practices in grapes, soil & leaf petiole analysis based nutrition, late pruning techniques & weather-based disease & pest management in grapes production.
It is worth mentioning that through his scientific & innovative management of grapes, Chintala achieved a record yield of 105 tonnes per hectare of Anab-E-Shahi seeded grapes & 84 tonnes / hectare Thompson seedless variety of grapes in his farm at Kundanpally.
The soil fertility method developed in the year 2002 was introduced in grapes in his Kundanpally farm successfully. After that in 2003, he repeated the technology in wheat, rice & black grapes that led to high yields & high nutritive value.
The invention is a new way to improve soil fertility in cultivated lands (worn-out soil) with no inputs of chemical fertilizers bringing high yields with high nutritive value in crops such as wheat, rice and grapes.
Chintala has applied for patents in as many as 60 nations for the technology & has got patents from India, Australia, Sri Lanka, Europe, South Africa, Eurasia, Madagascar, Mexico, Philippines, Vietnam, Romania , Nigeria and so on.
Moreover, he has won many awards including the State awards in 1999 & 2001, the Uttam Rythu Puraskar in 2006 and so on.
