The School of Business Studies (SBS), Punjab Agricultural University, under the umbrella of NIDHI-TBI supported by the Department of Science and Technology, hosted an inspiring visit of an NRI couple from the USA, Mr Kapil and Mrs Nikki, who have returned to India to steward their 75 acres of potato and banana cultivation farms – their ancestral agricultural legacy at village Bahraich, Uttar Pradesh. Being fourth-generation farmers, the duo is now personally managing their family farms and exploring technology-led interventions with parents as production oriented team. They visited as the fourth generation couple with a motive to create value chain across the potato and banana supply chains.
Having previously worked in technical roles in the United States, Mr Kapil and Mrs Nikki shared their agripreneurial vision to introduce hydroponics and aeroponics for potato cultivation along with product development innovations. Their proposal emphasized year-round production, resource efficiency, traceability, and premium quality, along with downstream value addition through grading, cold-chain integration, and branding of potato and banana based products for domestic and export markets.
The visit and interaction were facilitated and directed by Mr Ajay Pal Singh and Dr Samesh Dua, proud alumnus of PAU, who encouraged the founders to leverage the University’s incubation and mentoring ecosystem. Mr Kanwar Jot Singh from the team ‘Dr Punia Agro Care’ also visited alongwith the entrepreneurs.Offering strategic guidance, Dr Ramandeep Singh, Principal Investigator of NIDHI-TBI and Director, SBS, highlighted the need to validate the techno-economics of models for potato and banana under existing soil conditions. He advised a phased pilot to optimize input-output ratios, yield consistency and cost curves. He also underscored the importance of a strong go-to-market plan focusing on provenance-led branding, quality certifications and B2B partnerships to de-risk early adoption and build scalable value chains.
Dr Poonam Sachdeva, Co-PI of NIDHI-TBI and Principal Food Technologist, lauded their decision to return and innovate within Indian agriculture. She emphasized the promise of clean-tech cultivation for premium crops and encouraged integration of post-harvest handling, food safety, and value-added processing to enhance shelf life and consumer trust. Her remarks reinforced the role of science-backed entrepreneurship in strengthening farm incomes. The NIDHI-TBI team CEO Mr Gurinder Singh shared targeted inputs on market discovery, brand positioning, and customer validation, emphasizing early engagement with institutional buyers, exporters, and premium retail channels.
Mr Sameer Gautam, Business Manager, TBI, highlighted opportunities for strategic partnerships with cold-chain players, certification bodies, and agri-tech solution providers.
The team assisted the budding entrepreneurs to register them through google form submission. The interaction reaffirmed NIDHI-TBI’s role in enabling market-ready, scalable agribusinesses through technology, mentorship, and market access.