At 70, most people look forward to retirement and relaxation, but not Dusharla Satyanarayana. At 70, he proudly stands in front of a huge forest. He transformed his 70-acre ancestral land into a forest, dug a canal to irrigate it, and created small water bodies. He has been dedicated to these efforts since childhood, truly setting himself apart.
How far would someone go to prove their love for nature? Planting saplings and cultivating gardens might seem routine compared to the life of Dusharla Satyanarayana, who has dedicated his life to creating a forest home to some of the most exotic plants and animal species.
Born into a family of landlords in Raghavapuram village, Mothe mandal, Suryapet district, Satyanarayana felt a spiritual connection to nature from an early age. At 27, he left his bank job as a field officer to focus on his true calling. Since childhood, he had been transforming his 70-acre ancestral land into a natural paradise, and he wanted to commit to it full-time. Now 67, Satyanarayana believes that the plant and animal species thriving on his land are the “real owners” while he is merely their “servant.”
His farm, which he describes as a house with “360 doors and 660 windows,” is the result of five decades of dedicated effort. Satyanarayana traveled extensively, collecting seeds and saplings of rare forest species from across the country to plant on his land. He single-handedly dug a canal system to harvest rainwater from a hillock to water his plants. He also had seven ponds dug, with check dams forming a chain similar to the irrigation tanks built by the Kakatiyas. To ensure these ponds never dried up, he installed a borewell. The ponds are surrounded by various species of lotus, where fish, tortoises, native frogs, and other beings thrive.
His forest includes hundreds of species, such as Indian birthwort, devil’s horsewhip, Indian screw tree, Spanish jasmine, screw-bean, Indian tamarind, Manila tamarind, common guava, several varieties of mango, woman’s tongue tree, jamun, bael, cluster fig, neem, palm, ail, Indian date palm, Babul, jana, sacred tree, east Indian ebony, carandas plum, Indian jujube, Assyrian plum, bamboo, Prosopis juliflora (Thumma), soft fig, and Indian elm, enriched by many medicinal plants as well.
A native of Raghavapuram village in the Mothe Mandal of Surya pet district, Telangana, he is confident that his legacy will endure. “I started creating the forest when I was just four years old. The area used to be grazing land, where I would scatter tamarind seeds and other plant seeds. My passion and love for nature from an early age made me want to have trees around me,” he says.
“The Nizams ruled the area until the late 1940s. My ancestors worked under them and controlled the vast land, primarily using it for pasture, irrigation, and farming,” he says.
In 1948, after the Nizam-ruled region became part of India, the family became the sole owners of the land. As Dusharla grew older, his love for nature only grew stronger.
Over time, the family’s ownership reduced to 70 acres. This, he says, was because his great-grandfather and grandfather lost most of the property. “Relatives and friends tampered with documents and seized the land. This part of the land is the last bit that has remained under my possession and continues to face similar threats,” he explains.
“My father still owned 70 acres, and I began spreading seeds to create a forest. My parents did not oppose me, recognizing my positive intent to contribute to the environment. Often, my classmates or villagers would enter the plantations or try to harvest resources, but I always shooed them away,” he says.
“My son is a veterinary doctor. He shares my love for nature and is not driven by money. The forest will thrive even after I’m gone,” he assures.
His forest hosts a wide variety of wildlife. “If a 50-year-old tree contributes an estimated ₹1,58,46,500 in value to the earth, then the total value added by my forest should be between ₹2,000 and ₹3,000 crore,” he points out.
In addition to his forest conservation efforts, Satyanarayana founded the ‘Jala Sadhana Samithi’ in the 1980s, a movement aimed at bringing irrigation to the drought-prone areas of the former Nalgonda and Mahabubnagar districts.
His activism also highlighted the issue of fluorosis affecting the people of Nalgonda, bringing it to national attention and compelling the government to take action.
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