Mangoes: India
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History
Some history some varieties
Sneha Bhura, June 2, 2024: The Times of India
Amir Khusrow called it ‘Fakhr-e-Gulshan’, the pride of the garden. Mirza Ghalib roamed the orchards and sang paeans to the king of fruits. Not just poets, the mango can make even ordinary people wax eloquent over their favourite fruit. But the truth is while fans fight social media wars over which variety is the best, most people end up consuming only the more popular varieties such as Alphonso, Langra, Chausa, Safeda and Kesar, ignoring the pleasures of the lesser-known. But now some mango lovers are making an effort to save India’s ‘aamazing’ mango’s diversity. Among them are the Sheherwali Jains, a trader community which migrated from Rajasthan to Murshidabad, West Bengal and is known to grow, eat and cook with mangoes.
At the Bari Kothi Heritage Hotel in Murshidabad, the Sheherwali Jains are hosting the ‘Great Mango Festival’ to showcase some famed varieties from the Murshidabad region. There’s Rani Pasand (a favourite of the erstwhile Nawab’s wife) and Bimli (named after a hard-working Hindu maid employed in Mir Jafar’s leisure garden filled with mango trees), Dudhia Ananas and Ananas (a pineapple-flavoured mango), and the delicate Kohitoor. In mango lore, it’s said that the golden yellow Kohitoor was fragile enough to lose its taste if it fell to the ground. It needs to be wrapped in cotton wool to avoid damage from fingerprints and should be sliced with a sharp bamboo wedge, not a knife. Today, it sells at Rs 350 apiece. The festival will hold a special mango cutting masterclass by Pratibha Dudhoria, the ageing matriarch of the palatial residence-turned-luxury hotel.
“There are many challenges to cultivating and preserving rare mango varieties like Kohitoor and Ananas in Murshidabad. Widespread use of artificial ripening agents like carbide has hit quality. But our farmers continue to use traditional methods to sustain their unique flavours for future generations,” says Darshan Dudhoria, co-founder of the hotel. Mangoes were first found 60 million years ago in Damalgiri, present-day Meghalaya. And India remains the leading producer in the world, yielding 25 million metric tons of mangoes annually. According to the National Horticulture Board, India has over 1,500 varieties.
Sakhil Thaiyyil from Thrissur has been chasing lesser-known mangoes across Kerala ever since his childhood mango tree was axed. He formed a ‘mango hunters’ community on Facebook in 2019 called ‘Naadan Maavukal’ (native mango trees), which is now over 60,000 strong. If a member puts a post about an unidentified mango tree, Thaiyyil gets them to send two samples. “If it’s of good quality, I go there myself and talk to the owners about the origin of the tree. I check the seeds and we produce saplings to distribute across the state for free,” says Thaiyyil, who has coined names for unknown varieties such as Neelanjalam (blue sapphire). Among the 800 varieties identified so far, about 100 are of superior quality and 50 new ones have been submitted to the College of Agriculture in Vellanikkara for further development. “I find much joy in the pursuit and the fact that people will get to eat these new varieties,” he says.
RATAUL’S RANGE
Uttar Pradesh, the largest mango producing state, is the birthplace of famed varieties like Dasheri, Langra, Chausa and Amarpali. Historian Sohail Hashmi’s annual mango walks in the orchards of Rataul have enlightened many a mango enthusiast about the sheer range here such as the good-looking but bland ‘Haramzada’ to ‘Hakimuddin Gola’ which looks like a ball and is named after the man who made Rataul a major mango hub. Then there’s ‘Zardalu’ which looks like a dried apricot and ‘Tamuriya’, after 15th century conqueror Timur, who is said to have crossed present-day Ratual on his way to sack Delhi.
“Crossbreeding and grafting of mangoes picked up pace during the Mughal era, with many of its mansabdars creating hundreds of varieties. Usually, they were named after the village or orchard where they grew. But with 20 different mango varieties in one orchard, they began using creative names,” says Hashmi, ruing the disappearance of several interesting varieties from metros, like the Saroli in Delhi. “The really tasty ones are not produced in great quantities. So, marketing rare varieties is not very profitable,” he adds.
MITHILA’S BOUNTY
In 2022, Delhi-based Madan Jha started the Mithila Mango Festival in his native village of Sarisab Pahi, Madhubani district. “We wanted to create awareness and interest, especially among the youth who are not keen on mango cultivation. We get mango farmers, agricultural scientists, cultivators and lovers of the fruit under one umbrella, hoping to make the mango economy more vibrant,” he says. The village orchards are called Budhesh Bagichas (locals say these gardens existed from the time of Lord Buddha, who was a mango lover), and some varieties are named after gods (Hanuman Bhog, Sita Bhog, Durga Bhog). Then there are the off-beat ones like ‘Jarda’, which has a whiff of pan-jarda, and ‘Pahun Padauna’ which means a guest’s fart for its not-so-pleasant smell. Some 175 varieties were displayed at the festival in 2023. The third edition, scheduled to start on June 15, will have more. “We want these mangoes to travel outside Bihar and are working with researchers to see if their shelf life can be increased,” Jha adds.
CELEB TASTE
Some varieties are the work of ‘Mango Man’, as self-taught horticulturalist Kaleem Ullah Khan from UP’s Malihabad is known. The 84-year-old padma Shri has cultivated over 300 kinds from a single mother tree since the 1980s by grafting. Some of his prized creations are named after celebrities like Sachin Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, PM Modi, etc. There’s even one named after him — Kaleem, a hybrid of Dasheri and Sindoori. “I did not give this name, a worker in my orchard did. But I am running out of names for sure. There are more varieties in my garden than names I can come up with,” he says.
The list
➤ DHAKIMUDDIN GOLA: Looks like a ball, and is named after the man who established the first orchard in UP’s Rataul
➤ HARAMZADA: Also from Rataul, this mango is good-looking but blander than its name suggests
➤ ZARDALU: This aromatic variety from Bhagalpur, Bihar is named after dried apricots
➤ TAMURIYA: Named after 15th century invader Timur, who is said to have crossed present-day Rataul on his way to sack Delhi
➤ JARDA: From Champaran and has a whiff of pan-jarda
➤ PAHUN PADAUNA: The name means a guest’s fart. Clearly, a smelly variety
Available varieties of mango
Main varieties
The Times of India, May 31 2015
Sohail Hashmi
Beyond the venerable Alphonso and delectable Dussehri, there is a whole world of quirky, fragrant mangoes waiting to be savoured
The mango season is upon us, but north India is unlikely to see too many fruits in 2015.
Unseasonal rains and hailstorms have taken a heavy toll of all early flowering varieties, and so Baiganpally, the earliest variety of Andhra mango, wrongly called Safeda, is having a field day.
But the original Safeda and much else besides is available in the neighbourhood of Delhi, a bare 40 km away at Rataul. The journey will take you through long patches of crowded strips of potholes that call themselves roads.But the riches that await you at journey's end will make you forget all the bumps, breaks, jolts and jerks suffered in your search for mangoes that connoisseurs like Ghalib spent a lifetime praising.
There are, of course, the star names among mangoes, led by the venerable Ratnagiri Alphonso. This league includes Malda, Baiganpalli, Langda, Chausa also known as Samar-e-Behisht (the fruit from heaven), and Dussehri.But what few know are the many delectable mangoes that are on the verge of becoming rare because there is little hype surrounding them. There is Karela, so named because the fruit looks like the bitter gourd, of which only one tree survives in a private garden in Bhopal.Then there is Neelam from the south, succulent and fragrant, which rarely reaches the northern market. This variety is more well-known in the Sindh area of Pakistan.
Sarauli, another variety found across UP and Delhi, is rapidly becoming a rarity because of its very short season It looks somewhat like the Sindoori but it does not have a red tinge at the top. The Kesar of Gujarat is another variety that is barely known outside of west India. In Rataul, you will see Gola Safed, Surkha, Malik Pasand, Kalkatiya Aaman, Lakhnawi Deenga, Lalit and Gol Badhiya -all varieties that are becoming increasingly rare.
There are virtually thousands of varieties that were developed in orchards spread across India but only a few produced in sufficiently large quantities to make a mark in the major mango consuming areas. But for a taste of at least some of these exotic varieties, a trip to Rataul might be well worth the effort.
Amongst the biggest orchards set up here by local landowners are Maulvi Hakimuddin's Noor Bagh; Mazhar-udDin Siddiqui's Kaataki Bagh (named after the month of Kar tik); and Aftab ud-Din Siddiq ui's Bhopal Walon ka Bagh.
There are inter esting stories behind these orchards.
Maulvi Hakimud din was for some time deputy rev enue minis ter in Bhopal about 100 years about 100 years ago; he later worked as the tehsildar of Amroha and rose to become deputy collector.He was always interested in mangoes but it was perhaps his stint at Amroha, a place that gets its name from its mangoes and rohu fish, that led to a lifelong passion for rare varieties of mangoes and grafted new ones.
After him, his younger son Badr-udDin Chishti, set up a nursery that provided cuttings of these rare varieties to those interested, and thus many mango varieties spread to areas where they were not traditionally grown. This included faraway Multan. Chishti was followed by Mohammad Aafaaq, a close relative, who developed the nursery and began a scientific catalogue listing 400 varieties along with a short description of each type. At least one printed copy is in the possession of the current inheritor of the Noor Bagh, Zahoor Siddiqui.
Siddiqui, a former history teacher at Delhi University, and his wife Nishat Saiyada, a former teacher, have returned to the village after retirement to start a school for girls in their ancestral havelis. They also host hordes of mango-hungry people every year.
The visitors arrive in bus loads, braving the hot humid weather. They come not just to feast on the famous varieties though these too are grown here, but also to gorge on Mazhar Pasand, Zard Aaloo, Malik Pasand, Khas-ulKhas, Makhsoos, Shakar-Chini, GulabJamun, Husnara, Bride of Russia, Heer, Ubedi, Deenga-Lakhnawi, Suhag, Lalit, Jog-Bachcha, Kacheriya and scores of other less celebrated types.
The feast begins with traditional monsoon lunch of poori and aaloo ki tarkari, seetaphal ki sabzi, raita and laal mirch lehsan ki chutni along with food for the carnivores as well, followed by as many mangoes as you can eat and everyone gets to carry home 5 kg of the choicest. The monies saved after paying for expenses go as a contribution to the school.
Noorjahan
June 8, 2021: The Times of India
From: June 9, 2021: The Times of India
While 'Alphonso' might have the tag of the 'king of mangoes', 'Noorjahan' mangoes of Alirajpur, Madhya Pradesh certainly takes the cake owing to its humongous size - TNN
Noorjahan mangoes are claimed to have their roots from Afghanistan - TNN
Around 250km away from Indore, Noorjahan mangoes are cultivated in Katthiwada region of Alirajpur district in Madhya Pradesh - TNN
Shivraj Singh's family has been cultivating 'Noorjahan' since 1965 and he is the third generation into the cultivation of the fruit - TNN
Ranging between 1 kilogram to maximum 3.5 kgs, the mango sells at a rate of Rs 1,000 per piece - TNN
The yield has been good this year, but, the lockdown has had impacted the sales of these mangoes- TNN
Shivraj's brother, Roop Singh sells grafted Noorjahan saplings which costs around Rs 1,300 per sapling and Rs 1,600 per 3 feet sapling in case of courier -TNN
The order for fruit starts from the month of April whereas the demand of saplings continue throughout the year, especially from May-June -TNN
As per the two brothers, their grandfather had bought two saplings from Valsaad's plant nursery in the year 1965 - TNN
As Noorjahan was quite famous then, their grandfather ended up christening the yielded fruit with her name - TNN
Exports
2020-21
Sidhartha , May 14, 2021: The Times of India
From: Sidhartha , May 14, 2021: The Times of India
If everything goes according to the plan, a Himsagar mango from Bengal may land on a plate in South Korea, or a Zardalu could reach Mauritius. India, the world’s largest mango producer, is looking to diversify its basket for exports and will push varieties from North India, while also resuming shipments to the US.
“We are looking to push a number of varieties such as Langda, Dussehri, Himsagar and Zardalu. Currently, our exports are dominated by Alphonso and Kesar but there is a lot of demand for other varieties too, given the diaspora across the globe as well as from others,” said M Angamuthu, chairman of the Agricultural & Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (Apeda).
There is also an effort to diversify the markets beyond the strongholds of the UAE, the EU and Nepal, with Japan, South Korea, Australia and Mauritius also on the radar. Although India is the largest producer, Mexico and even Pakistan command a higher share of the export market, which India is trying to capture. While domestic consumption as well as high sugar content, especially in the north Indian varieties is seen as the factors for low exports, there are issues related to standards too.
For instance, shipments to the US have been impacted due to the requirement for irradiation of Indian produce given its exposure to fruit flies.
In fact, during the last financial year, mango exports were significantly lower than the previous financial year. Compared to exports of over $56 million in 2019-20, last year’s shipments were valued at around $28.3 million between April and February. It can partly be attributed to the lockdown, which coincided with the peak season.
This year, Apeda has stepped up efforts with special emphasis on Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Uttarakhand. Several training programmes have been conducted with facilities set up in Varanasi and Saharanpur that comply with global norms. Besides, irradiation facilities in Mathura, Uttarakhand and Bihar have been planned in addition to those in Lucknow, Nashik, Bangalore, Vashi.
GI tags
2018: Alphonso from Konkan gets GI tag
October 11, 2018: The Times of India
The Alphonso mango from Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg and adjoining areas of Konkan region in Maharashtra has got the Geographical Indication (GI) tag — an exclusive label used for products that have a specific geographical origin and possess qualities or reputation that are due to that origin.
“Such a name (tag) conveys an assurance of quality and distinctiveness which is essentially attributable to its origin in that defined geographical locality,” ministry of commerce and industry said in a statement on Friday.
Called the king of mangoes, Alphonso, known as ‘Hapus’ in Maharashtra, is prized in the domestic and international markets for its taste, fragrance and vibrant colour. It has long been one of the world’s most popular fruits and is exported to various countries including Japan, Korea and Europe.
The first product to get a GI tag in India was Darjeeling tea in 2004. There are 325 products from India that carry this indication. Mahabaleshwar strawberry, Blue Pottery of Jaipur, Banarasi sarees, Banglar rasogolla of West Bengal, Madhubani paintings of Bihar, Mysore silk of Karnataka and Tirupati laddus are some products with GI tag.
Hybrids
6,000 hybrids developed, 1984-2017
6,000 mango hybrids developed in 33 years|Jul 18 2017 : The Times of India (Delhi)
Mango lovers who find delight in Dussehri and can't resist the charms of Chausa may soon savour the goodness of both in a single fruit. The Central Institute of Subtropical Horticulture has developed a hybrid of Lucknow's Dussehri and Chausa varieties, which it says is a perfect mix of both. Named CISH-M-2, the hybrid ripens at the end of the Dussehri cycle and just before Chausa hits the market. It is shaped like the `mother' Dussehri but the taste is a blend of both, the institute said. The hybrid will now be tested in other labs of the country to assess its commercial viability.
CISH said the hybrid's shelf life is comparable to Dussehri and it is easy to grow without any specific culture or precautions, they said.
The institute has also crossed Dussehri with Florida's Tommy Atkins mango and the fruit it bore had low sugar content and red tinge on the skin while retaining the shape of Dussehri.Another cross between Neelam and Tommy Atkins matures when the mango season ends.
These hybrids are among 6,000 varieties CISH has developed in 33 years of its mango hybridisation programme.These include mangoes with exotic names like Eldon, Bride of Russia and Sensation, which resulted from crossing varieties from Brazil with those from Lucknow and Varanasi, such as Dussehri, Chausa and Langda.
After rigorous evaluation, the institute has been able to release two varieties for farmers to grow. Ambika is a hybrid of Amrapali (from Lucknow) and Janardan Pasand (from the south), and Arunika, a cross between Amrapali and Vanraj (from Gujarat), are grown by farmers and are being sold at premium prices. Both varieties can adapt to differ ent climatic conditions in the country.
The focus of the programme is on regular varieties with reddish peel, suiting the preference of the export market, hence the crossing of local mangoes such as Neelam, Vanaraj and Janardhan Pasand with mangoes from Brazil and US. One of the hybrids has a paper-thin stone.
“Some of these hybrids are high on beta carotenoids (pro vitamin A) and leupol in the pulp while some others are about 15% sweeter than the sweetest Dussehri,“ said CISH director Shailendra Rajan.
Strangely , one of the most popular and highly exported variety, Alphonso, finds no place in the programme.
“Hybrids of Alphonso as male or female parent are not successful in the north, given its poor yield and moderate quality in this climate. In Lucknow, Alphonso is a shy bearer and matures late during rainy season and is not as attractive as the Ratnagiri Alphonso either,“ said Rajan.
The product is heavier when Langda, Chausa, Kensington and Bombay Green as female parents are crossed with Rumani, Totapuri, Eldon and Vanraj. Similarly , hybrids of Surkh Burma and Tommy Atkins and Eldon, Vanraj and Tommy Atkins and Eldon and Vanraj have red peel like no other.
Mango hybrids take more than two decades to reach the market because tonnes of the fruit are required for developing a variety that is feasible.
