Garden of wellness: 55-year-old Jalandhar resident grows his own herbal remedies

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, September 14

Amanjit Singh Bakshi (55) discovered his green thumb as a child. He further honed this hobby over the period of time. Tending to his home garden for six—seven hours and seeing his plants bloom keeps him thriving. He believes that surroundings have a great impact on one’s personality, so he made the plants his companion. “They are just like living creatures, which demand all the care, love and regular cossetting.

A proud owner of a large variety of fruit plants, ranging from peach, plum, guvava, imported guvava, apple, mango, grapefruit, sapodilla (chikoo), mitha fruits (Citrus limettioides which fights against viral fevers) to vegetable plants, almost each variety of plants are planted at Bakshi’s garden here in Pholriwal. He says he used to live in the Urban Estate Phase I, but the house did not have much space for the garden, so three years back, he decided to shift to a place where he could dedicate a good portion of land towards gardening. “I now have my garden set up on an area of 1,400 sq ft,” he said.

He shared, “My daughter is married and my son lives in Gurugram, I live here with my wife. I carry out my business activities from home only so that I can work amid nature. Besides, Amanjit said his garden was also home to two hens. “As we are now used to eating only home-grown fruits and vegetables, we have kept two hens too, so that we do not have to buy eggs from outside.” Amanjit first said he had no gardeners to tend to his garden and he alone managed to take care of each plant. “It’s been a decade that I bought fruits from outside. We eat fruits that are grown in our garden,” he said.

With a variety of medicinal plants such as insulin, tulsi, gilloy, amla, aloevera, shatavar and ashwagandha and vegetables, including bitter gourd, ridge gourd (tori), brinjal, chillies, mint, coriander, drum stick, and many more in his garden, Bakshi said, he has got remedy to every ailment and that he never took any antibiotics.

“My wife is diabetic, so I make sure she eats the leaf of an insulin plant, which is good for maintaining blood sugar. Besides, we are very fond of ‘Mitha’ plants and we eat that every day, this fruit is not commonly found outside, so even my neighbours too visit me to have this fruit from me,” he added.