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Babulal Dahiya is a farmer and poet.He was awarded India's fourth highest civilian the Padma Shri. About 30 km from Maihar, lies Pithaurabad village in the Unchehara block of Satna district in Madhya Pradesh. What is unusual about this village is the 2-acre land, where you will find 110 varieties of rice crop. The farm belongs to 72- year- old Babulal Dahiya, who has been collecting these varieties since 2005. In the rest of the 6 acres, Babulal has also grown 100 more varieties of pulses, grains and vegetables. Babulal also had an unusual knack for Bagheli (a local language in Madhya Pradesh) poetry and storytelling right from childhood. So, even after finishing his studies and working as a postmaster in his village, he would keep participating in poetry meets and performances. Soon he started writing columns for renowned publications like Navbharat Times. Babulal became a household name soon in the Bagheli speaking tribal community and joined the Madhya Pradesh Adiwasi Lok Kala Academy. The academy requested him to document Bagheli folk literature -songs, proverbs, folktales, legends, myths and so on, to retain their culture. Babulal, who was already passionate about Bagheli literature, then authored five books on Bagheli oral folk literature and published two poetic collections.Babulal would often think about how one can save folk culture by preserving the songs and folktales, but what about the diverse variety of grains and crops that were once a part of the culture? Thus, in 2005, Babulal started his mission of saving the rice varieties that he had heard about in folktales and songs. He started visiting each and every farmer across the country, who had seeds of the unique varieties of rice and sowed them in the 2-acre space of his 8-acre land. Babulal has also formed a Sarjana Samajik Sanskritik and Sahityik Manch, which has served as a medium for documenting and disseminating information on traditional seed varieties.