Dhinki delight in Odisha: Bringing back hand-pounded ragi
When doctors suggested finger millet gruel for her husband’s ailment, Saraswati Naik of Asuki village in Kendujhar district not only started growing ragi, but also pounded it by hand to retain its nutritional value. She now swears by it.
Saraswati Naik of Asuki village in Kendujhar district of Odisha talks about how she began growing ragi to include the millets in her sick husband’s diet and why she advocates using the traditional wooden dhinki to pound ragi manually – in her own words.
In 2016 my husband was working as a driver in Andhra Pradesh. Suddenly he fell ill. The doctors diagnosed it as a kidney ailment.
When he returned to our village, I was shocked to see him. He was looking pale and weak. He had lost about 15 kg. I couldn’t control my tears.
It was a difficult period for us. He couldn’t work. We spent our hard-earned savings on his treatment. I had to sell my gold earrings, which my mother had gifted to me.
The doctor advised us to include ragi (finger millet) gruel along with boiled vegetables in his daily diet. With a healthy diet, it took him eight months to stand on his feet. I’d say, thanks to ragi, a miracle crop.
Ragi has immense health benefits. It improves digestion and cools down body temperature in summer.
It needs less water and less labour. So we call it a low-duty crop. Ragi was replaced by paddy as our staple food nearly 30 years ago as paddy is more remunerative.
Upon seeing the speedy recovery of my husband, with his support, I started cultivating ragi. Last year we harvested 7 quintals of ragi from one acre. We kept 2 quintals for domestic use and sold 5 quintals. We earned Rs 23,000 from it.
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Since the arrival of paddy processing mills, we had stopped using dhinki (a traditional wooden pounder made from the trunk of sal tree). Dhinki is used to remove the husk from grains like millet and rice and pound them into flour.
I decided to bring back the dhinki to preserve our traditional knowledge of processing grains.
Although I started using dhinki at home, the other women were not convinced. They found getting the grains powdered in flour mills easier and less time consuming.
To convince them I told them how hand-pounded ragi flour retained its nutritional value and tasted good. I also reminded them of our religious rituals that need dhinki kuta (pounded) ragi flour as an offering to god.
They were still reluctant to use the dhinki.
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In villages, seeing is believing. People started believing me after hearing about my husband’s kidney ailment and recovery. People who had a dhinki but had stopped using it, repaired it. Now everyone in the village relishes dhinki kuta mandia chuna (dhinki-pounded ragi flour) gruel.
Now people from neighbouring villages are also keen to revive this practice.
Dhinki is not just a wooden pounder. It reflects our culture and tradition. It’s our identity. There is a unique joy in pounding ragi in a dhinki. It brings back my childhood memories of assisting my mother to pound ragi when I was 10 years old or so.
My husband and I have taken a vow to further popularise dhinki kuta mandia chuna.
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Reporting and photography by Abhijit Mohanty, a Bhubaneswar-based journalist.