Bhubaneswar: Raimati Ghiuria, popularly known as the Millet Queen, was awarded an honorary Doctorate by the Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT) on Thursday.
According to sources, this recognition was conferred to her by President Droupadi Murmu in a convocation ceremony of the OUAT. Ghiuria has spent many years committed to the preservation and promotion of millets, highlighting its significance in sustainable agriculture. Her efforts have elevated the profile of Odisha’s millets on an international level.
The ‘millet queen’ said, “When I was young, my Bada Ma (wife of father’s elder brother) Padma Shri Kamala Pujari used to collect different country-grown species of paddy. She was taking me with her to the farmlands, where I had learnt the technique of preserving the paddy varieties.”
“After I got married, I had found a few rare domestic species of paddy at my in-law’s house. Since then, I started preserving food grains. I have cultivated more than 77 varieties of paddy and over 300 varieties of millet this year for preservation,” Raimati from Koraput district stated.
“I have travelled to several villages to collect the millet and paddy species. However, millet has given me my identity and I am prospering for it. I have been awarded several times and attended national and international conferences,” the tribal woman asserted.
“I spent my early days in penury and was not even getting a square meal a day. I would appeal to farmer brothers and sisters, who are turning their faces away from farming, to take agriculture forward. So that, our future generation will never face food scarcity,” the ‘millet queen’ expressed.
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