On an afternoon in 2013, Vijay Desai, a grape farmer from Sangli in Maharashtra, was strolling through his vineyard. It was a routine check to monitor the health and growth of his produce. But something strange on one particular grapevine caught his eye.
The vine had branched out to fruit slightly elongated grapes as compared to the others in his vineyard. Initially, Vijay thought there was something wrong with the plant. However, a quick inspection proved otherwise. “The plant was healthy and it grew grapes like others in the premise, but it was only one branch that bothered me,” Vijay tells The Better India.
He adds, “I started farming in 1993, where I grew different varieties of grapes like Manikchand, Thamsal, Tas Ganesh, among others. But I had never seen grapes of such length.”
His curiosity and research led him to discover a new variety altogether, the name for which remains undisclosed as it awaits approval from the state agriculture department. The grapes grow 6 cm…
