C’garh: Bastar Produces First Tribal PhD Holder in Agriculture

Raipur: Dr. Vikki Kumar Netam, hailing from a very poor family, is the first tribal student in Bastar in Chhattisgarh to get a PhD in agriculture.

Netam was awarded a PhD in genetics and plant breeding at the 11th annual convocation of the Indira Gandhi Agriculture University at Raipur last week.

The tribal, who had faced many hardships to complete his education because of his humble family background, had moved the entire audience present on the occasion when he touched the feet of his mother, who brought him up despite facing severe financial crisis and losing her husband very early, after receiving the PhD at the function.

“I dedicated my PhD to my mother, who brought me up braving innumerable hardships”, he told this newspaper on Wednesday.

Netam, a native of Binjam village around 20 km from district headquarters of Dantewada in south Bastar, had lost his father when he was studying in Class IV.

Binjam was a former Naxal stronghold.

His mother was determined to ensure that his son pursued higher studies and funded his education by working as an agricultural labourer.

According to him, his mother had moved to her parental home in the village of Farsapur, around five km from district headquarters of Dantewada, defying an age-old tribal tradition to admit him in the local school where he studied up to class ten.

“As per our tribal tradition, a married woman is not allowed to move to her parental place even though she becomes a widow. There was resistance to such a decision by my mother by the local panchayat who considered it a violation of tradition. The panchayats of the two villages had finally met and decided to allow my mother to shift to her parental place with me for my education”, he recounted.

He cleared Class tenth board examination from the Faraspur school and later got admitted to the higher secondary school in Nelnar in Bijapur district in south Bastar.

After clearing the 12th board examination in horticulture science in the higher secondary school, he got himself admitted to the government college of horticulture and research in Jagdalpur, headquarters of Bastar to do his BSc (horticulture) and later MSc.

He did his PhD under Dr N. R. Rangare, professor of genetics and plant breeding in the Indira Gandhi Agriculture University in Raipur.

Netam has received the Young Scientist award in 2025.

He is currently serving as a guest faculty member in the government Shaheed Gundadhur College of Agriculture and Research in Jagdalpur.