As the fifth largest economy in the world, India boasts of a very vibrant startup ecosystem that is currently the third largest in the world and continues to grow at an annual rate of 12- 15 percent. While majority of the startups’ focus so far has been on niche technology sectors, one area that has fast gained prominence lately is the agritech sector. This can be majorly attributed to the huge impetus that the government has laid on improving the agriculture industry in the country by amplifying its budget allocation by a whopping 300 percent over the last decade and the numerous benefits & incentive programs that it has launched to nourish startup innovation within the agri sector. Adding on to this is EY’s latest report that projects the agritech market in India to be worth $25 billion by 2025. Among the myriad of startups operating in the agritech field, one that stands-out through its farmer centric business model and selfless efforts to improve the agriculture ecosystem country-wide is Sacred River Agri Technologies Pvt Ltd. – ‘Krishika’.

Based in Uttar Pradesh, Krishika was incepted by Anshumali Dwivedi (Founder) along with Pramod Rao (Co-Founder & Joint MD) and Krishna Prakash Dwivedi (Co- Founder), with a vision to revolutionize the agriculture industry in India by leveraging data and other modern technologies. “Having garnered vast experience in the corporate sector abroad, I returned to India with a desire to create a startup through which I can make an impact on the society. Post six months of market research, we realized that despite the huge market agriculture had in India, a significant amount of farm produce being exported from our country was being rejected due to the presence of high chemical content and deemed unfit for human consumption. At the same time, we also came across a group of agri experts who were looking for a platform to put their experience into play. Leveraging the vast business opportunity and the team’s expertise, we started Sacred River Agri Technologies Pvt Ltd in May 2020 and operated it under the brand name Krishika”, says Anshumali.

Delivering Crop Lifecycle Management Solutions at Farmers’ Doorstep

As a full-fledged crop lifecycle management solutions company, Krishika guides farmers right from the preseeding stage to pre-harvest – be it in terms of preparing the field for seeding, selecting the right seed variety, getting right inputs, to ways in which they can cutdown costs and reduce their chemical usage. To do so, the company has an internal team of agri experts called Krishika Kisaan Saarathis who personally visit the farms, interacts with the farmers to understand their problems/ concerns, and based on the gathered data, advices them about the kind of inputs to be used for their crop by taking

into account its soil chemistry and weather data. Additionally, farmers can also share the images of their field & the problem they’re facing to get the necessary guidance from the Krishika team. Through this ‘Phygital’ approach, the company has positioned itself as a go to partner seeking agri related guidance for the farmer communities in 1200 villages across 9 districts in UP.

Krishika's unique ability is to have personnel on the ground & connect physically with farmers, even in the digital era. It has proved to be a game changer in the market

“Our core team develops a suitable plan for each crop and its different varieties for entire season. Then, each of our Kisaan Saarathis are called to our Lucknow office early on in the season, where they are provided with all the necessary training and information about the optimum mix of inputs to be used for each crop variety. This information is then passed onto the farmers through YouTube, Facebook, or the ‘Kisaan Goshtis’ which is a farmers meeting organized by Krishika across various villages to personally disseminate information to the farmers and also encourage them shift towards cleaner agricultural practices. This unique ability of ours to have our personnel on the ground and connect physically with farmers even in today’s digital era has been a true game changer for us in the market”, explains Anshumali.

Prioritizing Farmers & End Consumers

Krishika always strives to make sure that farmers get the best value for their produce, while simultaneously ensuring the quality of the crop yield in such a way that they contain minimal chemical content and is safe for human consumption. Technology has been a key enabler for the company in this regard, wherein it uses satellite imagery to gather information about critical parameters such as soil chemistry, moisture content, crop health, weather report & forecast, diseases/pest infestation in crops, and many others. This information is then processed and prepared into separate farmer friendly capsules and sent out to each village on a weekly basis. This has helped the farmers immensely in being capable of identifying disease symptoms early and taking necessary precaution to safeguard their crops.


Understanding the risk of attracting more rodents/pest from neighboring fields if a farmer adopts completely organic farming practices, Krishika has adopted a blended approach where it allows the farmers to use minimal amount of chemicals, but then seed a customized solution for each crop comprising of ecofriendly inputs such as bio-fertilizers, bio-pesticides, and bio-fungicides. Most importantly, the firm does not charge any fee from the farmers for the advice it offers. As a source of revenue, the company works as a channel partner with numerous large agri input brands. It also has its own brand of bio-inputs named Saarathi.

The Way Forward

Throwing light on the future roadmap of Krishika, Anshumali concludes, “Going forward, we plan to leverage the data gather from farmers so far to develop new products for agri credit and agri insurance. Additionally, we will also be using AI to analyze the historical data to derive insights that help us provide better crop lifecycle management solutions to the farmers. While geographical expansion to broaden our target audience is also on the cards, our primary focus will be on promoting the Saarathi brand bio-inputs by expanding its products portfolio and launching the Sarathi Wheat in the coming Diwali”.