Take a remote village. Go to the smallest farmer there. Educate him in the best farming techniques. Inform him of daily weather conditions and price movements in the market. Make available to him at his doorsteps the best possible seeds, pesticides and fertilisers at the most competitive prices. And when his crop is ready, help him find the best buyer. Sounds tedious? Imagine doing all of this in 30,000 villages across six states season after season, year after year. Doing it at no cost to the farmer and yet making money for yourself. Impossible, would be the most obvious verdict to such a proposal.

PICTURE SPEAK

VILLAGE ONLINE: Farmers gather at an e-choupal in Andhra Pradesh

But that was not what Yogesh Chander Deveshwar, chairman of Rs 12,000 crore ITC, said when S. Sivakumar, chief executive of its agri-business, approached him with an equally ambitious idea in 2000. Knowing that he was asking for the moon, Sivakumar initially requested Rs 50 lakh to test the idea among soya farmers in Madhya Pradesh. Deveshwar granted him Rs 10 crore. The rest, as they say, is history. ITC's e-choupal network has already reached 3.1 million farmers, and is expanding into 30 new villages a day-making it corporate India's most ambitious rural initiative ever. Partnering ITC in the network are 37 companies, NGOs and state governments, together creating a new ecosystem for villages and establishing a direct link between what consumers eat and what farmers grow.

If you ask Deveshwar, the show has only just begun (see interview), but the initiative has already been termed path-breaking by The New York Times, The Economist, the Harvard Business School and the United Nations.

What exactly is the e-choupal and why is it revolutionary?

THE POWER OF 'e'

The e-choupal redefines choupal, the Hindi word for village square where elders meet to discuss matters of importance. The all-important letter in the word is "e". It stands for a computer with an Internet connection for farmers to gather around and interact not just among themselves but with people anywhere in the country and even beyond. It begins with ITC installing a computer with solar-charged batteries for power and a VSAT Internet connection in selected villages. The computer's functioning is freed from the notorious power and telecom facilities at the village level. A local farmer called sanchalak (conductor) operates the computer on behalf of ITC, but exclusively for farmers. The e-choupal offers farmers and the village community five distinct services:

Information: Daily weather forecast, price of various crops, e-mails to farmers and ITC officials, news-all this in the local language and free of cost.

ITC'S BOLD RURAL BET

It's achievement 5,050 choupals, 29,500 villages, 3.1 million farmers. Using e-choupal to source a range of farm produce (foodgrains, oilseeds, coffee, shrimps). Marketing a variety of goods and services though e-choupal (agri-inputs, consumer goods, insurance, market research). Transactions: $100 m (2003) It's ambition To reach 1,00,000 villages, 10 million farmers by 2010. Source a larger range of farm produce (spices, vegetables, cotton). Market a wider variety of goods and services (education, health, entertainment, e-governance) Transactions: $2.5 billion (2010)

Knowledge: Farming methods specific to each crop and region, soil testing, expert advice-mostly sourced from agriculture universities-all for free.

Purchase: Farmers can buy seeds, fertilisers, pesticides and a host of other products and services ranging from cycles and tractors to insurance policies. Over 35 companies have become partners in the e-choupal to sell their products through the network.

Sales: Farmers can sell their crops to the ITC centres or the local market, after checking the prices on the Net.

Development work: NGOs working for cattle breed improvement and water harvesting, and women self-help groups are also reaching villages through e-choupal. In some states farmers can even access their land records online, sitting in their village. Access to health and education services through e-choupal begins next month.

"E-choupal is like a grand orchestra that brings together everybody who has a stake in rural India under one roof so that each one's effort is maximised and harmonised," says Sivakumar. In many villages e-choupals have become the axis around which the local community revolves. Be it for accessing newspapers online in the mornings (many villagers have discontinued their newspaper subscriptions) or checking the supply of products they ordered on the Net, or watching movies on farming techniques in the evenings, farmers frequent e-choupal at all times of the day. Each e-choupal covers between five and six villages.

The sanchalak-called a pratinidhi in some states-is the most critical link in the e-choupal network. By choosing a farmer instead of parachuting an outsider to run e-choupals, the message ITC sends to the local community is clear-the e-choupal is by the farmer and for the farmer even though it is fully paid for and maintained by ITC. In just 2-3 years, sanchalaks have become the agents of change. They are the farmers' pointmen for information, sales and purchase. "My status in the nearby villages has gone up," says Akhilesh Singh, a sanchalak in Karai Purva village of Hardoi district, Uttar Pradesh. "Farmers consult me on all critical decisions and I am the repository of their transactions through e-choupal." That is the intangible benefit.

FROM FARM TO FIRM TO FORK

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There are tangible gains too. For every quintal of the produce sold to ITC from an e-choupal, the sanchalak gets Rs 5. In 2003-4, ITC distributed about Rs 3 crore to sanchalaks as commission. He also gets a commission on every product or service farmers buy though e-choupal. This has turned sanchalaks into entrepreneurs. It is in his interest to maximise e-choupal transactions, which benefits ITC. But since he is from the village, he also has to earn the trust of villagers and is answerable for deals made through him.

Sanchalaks are required to take a public oath of serving their community without discrimination and sign a social contract to spend a part of the income they earn from e-choupal on community welfare. They have become so sought after that recommendations for their appointments are coming to ITC from local politicians and state ministers.

To manage the hub of 50-odd e-choupals, ITC appoints a sanyojak (coordinator) who is either a former mandi trader or a local dealer of ITC products. He is the link between ITC and the sanchalaks and also earns a commission on e-choupal deals.

By building this unique human organisation in which farmers, traders, companies, government agencies and ngos compete and collaborate with each other, the ITC is-by design or by default-creating a new institution that is not a company, not a cooperative venture, not a government department but has some merits of all. It is this institutional innovation, created by what Deveshwar calls "a conspiracy of events", that puts ITC ahead of other companies entering rural India.

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