When Saunak Das was growing up in the one-street town of Gopiballavpur in what was then Midnapore district, the one thing he was eager to do was get out of town. While living in his spraw-ling family home with its spacious garden, he dreamed of owning a small flat in the big city. Some part of his intense wish to live the urban dream was spurred by wanting to make a name for himself, braving the anonymity of the big city, and some by the ridicule he faced as the country cousin each time he visited his mother’s family in the suburbs of Calcutta.

The road to the big city, as all those who have grown up in mofussil towns know, is paved with good grades. And Das had a great example in his studious elder brother. But Das was never a studious boy himself. He had too great an interest in sports and even represented his district in the state gymnastic championship. Producing excellent results in the classroom was, however, non-negotiable.

Das’s father had taken on the challenge of keeping alive a small government school near Gopiballavpur that was on the verge of shutting down due to lack of students. The first thing he did was move both his sons into the little-known school. It was the job of the Das brothers to win the scholarships that would keep the school relevant while their father spent his time convincing, cajoling, threatening and even bribing the poor tribals of the area to send their children to school. It is to his credit that the school continues to thrive today, decades after he has retired.

One of the unlooked for advantages of studying in that little school was that even during the worst days of Maoist insurgency, when people feared travelling through Jangal Mahal — of which Gopiballavpur is a part — Das Junior, who was living his urban dream in Calcutta, was assured safe passage.

Das moved to Jhargram, the closest urban centre, for higher studies, and thereafter to Calcutta. After a stint at a private firm, he started a waterproofing business with his chemi-cal engineer friend. Das had already acquired a flat in Dum Dum, in the eastern part of greater Calcutta. He went on to acquire all the other trappings of middle-class success — a branded wardrobe, an iPhone, a home theatre and bar, a new SUV, two vacations a year. Always willing to listento the other person’s point of view and lending a helping hand, Das also acquired a diverse group of friends, each chasing their own version of the urban dream.

It was one of them who took Das to the local organic market. Another introduced him to a couple who had given up their high-paying jobs in the US to settle down in Birbhum and grow their own food. Das was inspired.

The first to go were his branded clothes, next the family’s habit of eating out. Slowly, all the plastic goods were replaced, starting with the water bottles and tiffin boxes. Das started growing vegetables at home, then began composting his kitchen waste. He also convinced all his close friends to compost and recycle, or at least try to.

Even as he worked to waterproof multistoreys, he mulled ways people could grow their own food in urban gardens. He joined other groups to spread awareness about clean eating and composting. Das figured out that the best way to convince people to eat organic was to entice them with the better taste of organic leafy greens (shaak) and vegetables such as cucumber and brinjal. (Organically grown shaak tastes noticeably sweeter and doesn’t have the bitter aftertaste of commercially-grown shaak.) He couldn’t convince everyone to shop at a nearby organic haat and malls and speciality organic shops, so along with two others he started a delivery service that reached the organic fruits and vegetables to one’s doorstep twice a week.

In the beginning, Das himself delivered the produce in his SUV. There were so many orders, he was soon finding it hard to keep the delivery restricted to a day. People started asking forspecific products, so organically grown heirloom rice, dals, eggs, chicken, jaggery andhome-made jam, pickles, paneer and ghee also made it to the list.

But customers often did not get what they wanted; the availability of produce was dictated by the season, not by demand. This was a concept Das found very hard to explain to his urban customers, most of whom had never seen afarm up close.

The other thing he found difficult was procuring the volume of organic vegetables that his ever-growing customer base demanded. Not many farmers were willing to give up their tried and tested chemicals and fertilisers for vague promises of better produce. Spurred by the wish to demonstrate how profitable organic farming could be, Das decided to take it up himself. The three friends leased 11 bighas in Komdhara village in Hooghly district, an hour’s drive from his home, for this purpose.

The first season he had a plentiful crop of peas, carrots, spinach, lettuce and tomatoes, but few local farmers were convinced by his unconventional methods. And for the first time since he started the delivery service, he had a problem of plenty. He gave away bushels of peas and baskets of tomatoes to anyone who was interested.

In the beginning, the villagers laughed outright at the farming procedures he implemented and waited amusedly for him to give up and leave. But four successful harvests and a rising base of consumers have now got him grudging respect and tentative queries.

The man who owns the neighbouring field — and who was always very proud of his liberally fertilised, plentiful crop of potatoes — has finally figured out that Das made a greater profit on his potatoes because his input costs were low.

In his farming experiments, Das has won some and lost some but his will to change the world — or at least the farming methods around him — remains unbroken. He has built an eco-friendly house on the land and now plans to organise trips to his farm for urban dwellers interested in such things.

That’s a full circle, folks.