There was a time he could not afford ink for his pen, but Vijay Kumar Chansauriya lifted himself out of abject poverty to become a government school teacher in an adivasi village in Madhya Pradesh’s Panna district. When he retired, he donated his life’s savings for the cause of educating underprivileged children.

In Uttar Pradesh, 560,408 women self-help groups across the state’s 75 districts have helped rural women into self employment and economic independence. In Bareilly district, women associated with more than 7,000 SHGs are making barbed wire fences to masalas, growing their business and becoming self-reliant.

His willingness to experiment and try out new techniques of farming have led to farmer Sethpal Singh of Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, being awarded the Padma Shri. Here’s how the 55-year-old farmer practises integrated farming on his 15 hectare farmland.

Two out of every three Indians live in rural India, but rural India is media-dark and India's policymakers and citizens in general have no credible way of knowing what rural India wants, and what it doesn't. Gaon Connection, India's biggest rural communications and insights platform, has been created to do precisely this – give voice to the concerns, issues, challenges and achievements of rural India. Today, December 2, is our ninth anniversary. From a small room of a village school, today Gaon Connection has its network in 425 districts of India.

The humble broom has become an empowering source of livelihood for 1,500 tribal families in Koraput district of Odisha. Adivasi women, who earlier used to sell the hillgrass for making the brooms to middlemen for Rs 25 a kilogramme, are now directly selling to the government agencies at double the price.

Pravin Raghuvanshi, an entrepreneur and trainer who trains farmers in bee-keeping in Betul district, Madhya Pradesh, has created a buzz with his 100 bee boxes, which, on an average, get him about 3,000 kilogrammes of honey. Bee-keeping is a lucrative enterprise, he assures.

A teacher at a government school in Vynakat Van, Satna, has hit upon a novel idea that not just makes his chemistry classes extra fun, but also helps the students remember the periodic table.

Having tired of his stressful corporate job, Sachin Kothari decided he would turn to something that he loved doing and that would give him peace of mind as well as a healthy remuneration. He owns a nursery in Dehradun, Uttarakhand and his saplings travel across the country.

Concerned about the chemicals that pollute water bodies during the immersion of idols of Lord Ganesha, a group of school students have prepared an eco-friendly idol of the deity by moulding alum in the chemistry laboratory. Details here.

The Odisha government has decided to include pulses, millets, oilseeds, fruits and vegetables in its government welfare programmes, including meals offered at anganwadis and mid day meals at schools. Local recipes, millet laddus, sprouted green gram, crop diversification, women empowerment to be the focus of the initiative.