“Aquaculture has been in my family for generations. My father grew fish, my grandfather grew fish, my great grandfather did the same. Like many other families in this area, we have a large pond right next to our house, but fish were always seen as a ‘side’ thing.

I got in touch with the Ambuja Foundation team at one of the meetings in our village. They showed very interesting things about aquaculture - I was shocked to know that I had not been following many scientific practices. I was unaware about applying lime to maintain the pH balance of the pond. I wasn’t feeding the fish regularly and the feed I gave them was expensive and ineffective.

And so I tried implementing all this knowledge and even used another fish breed that gave good returns. Earlier I would hardly manage 250 kgs produce in a year and this year I got 1056 kgs. My profit jumped from Rs 22,000 to Rs 1.2 Lakh!

I soon realised that I was not utilising the pond to even 25% of its capacity. In fact, the wholesalers told me that my fish were so tasty that they always reserved it for their special customers. So what am I doing with the extra money? I am saving it to get more ponds on lease – my dream is big now!” - Naran Patra, Howrah, West Bengal