LUCKNOW, May 24:
Veteran mango cultivator Padma Shri Haji Kalimullah Khan has dedicated a new variety of mango to PM-designate Narendra Modi and christened it “NaMo Aam.” A celebrated expert in mango cultivation, Khan dedicated the variety of mango developed by him to Narendra Modi, and said, “When we listen to Modi ji we feel nice. He is very successful and loved by everyone.”
In his mango orchard that he refers to as his ‘workshop’, 74-year-old Haji Kalimullah is hoping the new variety he is developing tastes as good as it looks. Mr Khan said it was a gift that would be remembered long after him, and added, “The ‘NaMo’ mango will remain even when we are gone and will remind people of Narendra Modi and his success.” Mr Khan hoped to meet and present to the country’s fourteenth prime minister his humble tribute.
Following days of anticipation, the fruit has acquired distinct streaks of crimson like Husn-e-Aara and the elongation of the Dussehri. But why is this variety so important for the Padma Shree cultivator because, it will be named after India’s new PM Narendra Modi.
“We wish to meet him once. We will be very happy if he visits once and sees the ‘NaMo aam’ ripen,”Mr Khan summed up.
Meanwhile, it wasn’t just a bad year for chief minister Akhilesh Yadav’s and his Samajwadi Party. The mango variety named after him did not bear fruit last year. And Kalimullah said it may go fruitless this year as well. In Kalimullah’s orchard, a mango variety named Akhilesh has flowers on it, but none has matured into fruit.
Kalimullah, conducting ‘mango experiments’ in his ‘lab’ – a remarkably verdant orchard – since 1957, with the new variety,he wants to commemorate Modi’s win in a unique way. The variety is a cross between Kolkata’s Husn-e-Aara and Lucknow’s Dussehri. Kalimullah’s orchard has several desi mangoes as well as rare variants like ‘Ajayab’, ‘Surkh Maliyara’, ‘Aamil Lamba’, ‘Sharifa’ and ‘Amrapali’, to name a few. But, most of these, he says, were developed by earlier generations through grafting. ‘My technique is different. I cross flowers and then sow those seeds because every seed is different.’
“About 99 per cent experiments went waste. The few that survived brought me recognition. I sent Sachin Tendulkar the variety I named after him, a hybrid of Khasul Khaas and Chausa which weighs up to one kg,” said Mr Kalimullah. This time, he plans to send to Mumbai not only a variety called Sachin but also the one named after Aishwarya Rai. A seventh standard drop-out, he now plans to add more varieties to the old tree in his orchard, which originally was of a desi variety ‘Asl Mukarrar’ but now has over 300 varieties from Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and even Pakistan. (UNI)
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