The messiah who sacrificed everything for showing the way to farmers. To protect speechless creatures and save the platter from poison, Dr. Surender Dalal lit a ray of hope through Insect Literacy.

Dr. Surender Dalal – A glimpse on his life





In April 1962, a legend was born to Ganeshi Ram and Dhanwati Devi in Julana village of Jind district of Haryana. The legend was torchbearer of insect literacy - Dr. Surender Dalal. Ganeshi Ram ji, father of Dr. Dalal was an army man and mother Dhanwati Devi a noble house wife in a farming family. He studied up to 9th standard in his village school and then passed matriculation from Hindu High School, Sonipat. Being eldest among three brothers and two sisters he had to take up responsibility of younger siblings on his shoulders. He perfectly performed his duties for education of his brothers Vijay Dalal, Jagat Singh and Raj Singh. Destitution, education of younger siblings and family responsibilities forced him to quit studies and he joined a job in Hisar. During this time he got married to Kusum Dalal in 1979 and moved on with life. Kusum Dalal stood by him as a better half by all means without any regrets. They had two daughters Pritika, Ritika and one son Akshat. Mrs. Kusum Dalal got job in education department and then Dr. Dalal resumed his studies again and got admission in B.Sc. (Honors) in 1979 at Haryana Agriculture University. After completing B.Sc. in 1983, he completed M.Sc. in 1986 and Ph.D. in Plant Breeding in 1991 from same university. He got fellowship from ICAR for his master’s degree and Ph.D. During his studies he got in touch with progressive student’s union SFI and got connected to leftist ideology. Starting with simple member of SFI, he rose to state president-ship.

He had a warm corner for farmers and poor in his heart. He played active role in student movements and simultaneously contributed in farmers’, laborers’ and employees’ movements also. His life was always full of struggle and he faced everything with brave heart. He was honest, hard working, had strong will power, farsighted and eloquent speaker. He was second to none. He had a habit to go into depth on each and every issue. After Ph.D. he joined as scientist at Kol (Kurukshetra) branch of HAU in 1992. He resigned from the job after working on plant breeding after a year. Afterwards he joined as Agriculture Development Officer in Department of Agriculture Haryana and there he started working under Saksharta Abhiyan on deputation for bringing literacy among men and women. He possessed an incredible art to develop social, cultural and traditional consciousness among masses and organizing them. Conceptualization and presentation by literacy Satsangs and dramas with the help of his comrades was a great example of his caliber. He was master in converting the most difficult subjects into local language and presenting among masses. He was bold and blunt. He had specific interest in people’s history. He did research on role of people of Lijwana and nearby villages during freedom struggle. His works on presenting history of Bhura and Nighaya Nambardars lead marvelous struggle against British, Jind, Patiala and Nabha kings through plays, Ragini and tales. His creations prove that he was a great historian too. His starvation for social service increases further after educating people under Literacy Mission. He joined back in agriculture department as agriculture development officer in Nidana and nearby villages.

In 2001, an editorial published in English daily ‘A Collective Failure’ shook his life. American bollworm had destroyed cotton crop comprehensibly. Farmers, officers and scientists had to bend on their knees in front of this two and half inch long insect. It was uncontrollable even after 35 sprays. He could not bear the damage to image of agriculture department by this editorial. Then he focused entirely on insect management but in 2005 Mealybug did the damage to cotton and it was no secret. Then he changed his focus from insect management to insect literacy and came to a conclusion that farmers cannot come out of this vicious cycle unless they don’t learn about insects. Through his research on insects in 2007 he was able to invent a technique to successfully get rid of American Bollworm through farmers of village Roopgarh. It was his magnanimity that he accepted insect-master farmer Rajesh as his teacher to do further research. In 2008 he lit the torch of revolution in insect literacy in Nidana village. Dr. Dalal and insect-master farmers worked hard day and night to collect information about herbivorous and carnivorous insect and their activities in detail. In 2010 he involved women farmers in the movement along with male farmers. In this short period of 6-7 years he set a new path for the farmers of the country. During the research they found out 206 insects which included 43 herbivorous (generally known as harmful insects) and 163 carnivorous insects (generally known as friendly insects). He further categorized them into eating insects, sucking insects, flower and fruit eating insects, leaf eating insects. It was result of his research that he found insect literacy as the best weapon to bring farmers out of the battle between farmers and insects in which they were trapped for last 40 years. He knit together farmers from more than a dozen villages through insect literacy.

It was under his guidance that male and female farmers from more than dozen villages around Nidana got degrees in insect literacy. He along with his pupil farmers proved to the world that a delicate crop like cotton can be cultivated without using pesticides to get better yields and so other crops can also be cultivated without using pesticides. To strengthen the movement he involved Khap Panchayats. In 2012, under his guidance insect-master farmers wrote an application to Khap Panchayats to end the never-ending war between farmers and insects resulting in killing of farmers and speechless insects going on for last 40 years. Khap Panchayats which are famous for solving big issues concerning the society accepted the application and assured of justice. The intervention of Khap Panchayats in this issue brought them into social spheres again. Representatives of Khap Panchayats attended insect literacy school known as ‘Khet Pathshala’ regularly for 18 weeks to find out truth about the insect. In these 18 weeks representatives from more than 90 Khap Panchayats from all over Haryana came to the school to study the insects. It was his visionary mind which crafted a way out to reach to maximum farmers through Khap Panchayats. Because of this activity even the farmers from Punjab which is known as Mecca of agricultural development started visiting them to learn about insects from time to time. That was not the end, he used information and communication technologies like face book, blogs etc. and reached out to the entire world. He crated blogs namely; Parbhat Keet Pathshala, Nidana Gaon ka Gaurav, Apni Khet Pathshala, Mahila Khet Pathshala, Krishi Choupal, Naugama Blog, and YouTube channel to upload videos of insects to catch everyone’s eyes. Without caring about his health he established insect literacy as a viable alternative among farmers. Unfortunately, he caught swine flu in 2013. He was admitted to a private hospital but due to absence of ventilator he was further referred to other hospital where he went into coma. Then he was transferred to Fortis hospital in Delhi. After about three months’ fight between life and death the Insect Guru Dr. Surender Dalal left this world. On 19th the Messiah of farmers who sacrificed everything for farmers slept forever. All the efforts and prayers of family, friends, doctors, followers and farmers went in vain. On 19th may 2013 he was given a hearty farewell in his ancestral village Nandagarh. Everyone was shedding tears of sorrow for this true son of soil. He was a great loss, not only to family, village or Haryana state but to the entire country.

It’s an irreparable damage! Even if he’s not with us physically, but he will always remain with us. His experiences, his message of insect literacy, his thoughts, his life style, his bold nature, dedication to serve society will always make us feel his presence. It’s the result of this feeling that even after his death insect literacy is spreading further as he always desired. After his death farmers lead by insect-master farmers Ranbir Malik took the movement further and in 2013 Khap Panchayats gathered for the hearing of the case. On 20th Feb 2015, Sarv Khap Mahapanchayat was organized at Daffodil Public School of village Nidana. Representatives of Khap Panchayats of other states also participated in this Mahapanchayat. Retired judge from Punjab and Haryana high court Sh. S.N. Aggarwal, Secretary Haryana Farmers Commission Dr. R.S. Dalal, Food Policy Analyst Dr. Devinder Sharma were deputed as members justice committee. Here farmers and insects represented their sides. Insect-master farmers represented their case on the behalf of insects. After hearing all the arguments carefully justice committee came to a conclusion that farmers can learn a lot by joining insect literacy mission. This movement of insect literacy started by Dr. Surender Dalal must be brought out to farmers without any delay, so that use of poisonous pesticides can be stopped in the state and then country.


Nice photos of the insects in his profile album art which act like pesticides: https://www.facebook.com/surender.dalal


A post of how farmers are sharing their knowledge:

This is real education, where knowledge is created and shared with people for whom the knowledge is vital and they are going use it and add their discoveries to the knowledge. A organic growth of knowledge. Started with cotton crop but now for every crop it is expanding and must expand to the whole country.

A very nice presentation of the advantages of this model of not using pesticides.. do read for an interesting insight..
Nidana model of Biological control of Pests
(From above document)
Conclusion :
The Jury feels that the representations made before them by the various groups on 20th February in village NIDANA district JIND was a unique learning for them and recommends that the Knowledge left by Dr. Surinder Dalal must be imparted to the farmers without delay so that the usages of pesticides is stopped at the earliest in the interest of the State as a whole. By doing so, with little expenditure, the State would take a revolutionary step which will bring laurels to the State in whole of the country.

This is how he shared the knowledge with people…




This comment from Nikhil VJ is well said.
"Wow... this really screws the entire logic of GM technology. Ino and Iro accomplished what multi million dollar investments and copyright laws could not."