During the late 1950s, Gwalior-born Yeshwant Laxman Nene had felt humiliated when his professors at the University of Illinois in the USA, where he was doing his Ph.D in Plant Pathology (Virology), us
April 18, 2007 (Press Release) --
During the late 1950s, Gwalior-born Yeshwant Laxman Nene had felt humiliated when his professors at the University of Illinois in the USA, where he was doing his Ph.D in Plant Pathology (Virology), used to taunt him saying India did not have any record of agricultural operations in the country during ancient times. Trained in the nationalist tradition since his boyhood, Yeshwant had promised to himself that some day or other he would present to his country and the world the history of Indian agriculture as it existed since the days of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.
He never forgot this promise all through his teaching career at the Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agricultural Technology from 1960 to 1974 even after his singular research achievement in discovering, for the first time in the world, the role of zinc in rice cultivation. This discovery had saved the rice crops in the Pantnagar area of modern Uttarakhand which was wilting under the disease-locally called "khaira"-caused by lack of zinc in the soil.
From Pantnagar to Patancheru near Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh, where the International Crop Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) is located, which he had joined as a Plant Pathologist, Dr. Nene had to deal with the "mystery" of a disease afflicting the chick pea ("chana daal") crop with a disease called "wilt complex". Later Dr. Y.L. Nene became the Deputy Director General of ICRISAT (the Director General of this FAO-sponsored organization is always a non-Indian) from 1989 to 1996.
This knowledge the Foundation has been sharing with the world through a quarterly magazine called Asian Agri History Journal, which has never missed an issue in the last ten years – it has been delivered four times every year without fail and without any delay. Dr. Nene had taken early retirement in order to devote his time and resources for ensuring publication of not only the quarterly journal, as also a number of other documents such as the Krishi Parasara, Kashyapiyakrishisukti, and the volume written by Dara Sikoh, son Emperor Shahjehan, murdered by his younger brother Aurangzeb. Prof. Nene also has published documents recording observations of the first Mughal Emperor Babur, and of Jehangir, son of Emperor Akbar, which showed that Jehangir was a naturalist who meticulously recorded his observation about flora and fauna of each of the regions of his vast empire he had visited during his reign.
Apart from recording the agricultural tradition of the Indian sub-continent since the Vedic times, the Foundation publications throw some light on the history and culture of the people of the sub-continent since the Vedic times, which he places at 8000 B.C. for the Rg Veda. There are references regarding agriculture as prevailing in other countries of the region too since the Foundation collects information on agricultural heritage of the Asian region as a whole.
Recently, the Foundation brought out a 900-page volume recording the hi
He never forgot this promise all through his teaching career at the Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agricultural Technology from 1960 to 1974 even after his singular research achievement in discovering, for the first time in the world, the role of zinc in rice cultivation. This discovery had saved the rice crops in the Pantnagar area of modern Uttarakhand which was wilting under the disease-locally called "khaira"-caused by lack of zinc in the soil.
From Pantnagar to Patancheru near Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh, where the International Crop Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) is located, which he had joined as a Plant Pathologist, Dr. Nene had to deal with the "mystery" of a disease afflicting the chick pea ("chana daal") crop with a disease called "wilt complex". Later Dr. Y.L. Nene became the Deputy Director General of ICRISAT (the Director General of this FAO-sponsored organization is always a non-Indian) from 1989 to 1996.
This knowledge the Foundation has been sharing with the world through a quarterly magazine called Asian Agri History Journal, which has never missed an issue in the last ten years – it has been delivered four times every year without fail and without any delay. Dr. Nene had taken early retirement in order to devote his time and resources for ensuring publication of not only the quarterly journal, as also a number of other documents such as the Krishi Parasara, Kashyapiyakrishisukti, and the volume written by Dara Sikoh, son Emperor Shahjehan, murdered by his younger brother Aurangzeb. Prof. Nene also has published documents recording observations of the first Mughal Emperor Babur, and of Jehangir, son of Emperor Akbar, which showed that Jehangir was a naturalist who meticulously recorded his observation about flora and fauna of each of the regions of his vast empire he had visited during his reign.
Apart from recording the agricultural tradition of the Indian sub-continent since the Vedic times, the Foundation publications throw some light on the history and culture of the people of the sub-continent since the Vedic times, which he places at 8000 B.C. for the Rg Veda. There are references regarding agriculture as prevailing in other countries of the region too since the Foundation collects information on agricultural heritage of the Asian region as a whole.
Recently, the Foundation brought out a 900-page volume recording the hi
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