IIT scholar wins international award on plant nutrition

A food engineering research scholar from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur has won the prestigious International Plant Nutrition Scholar Award.

The award was recently given by the US-based International Plant Nutrition Institute to K Ashok Kumar, research scholar at the department of agricultural and food engineering, IIT Kharagpur, officials said. The award carries a cash prize of USD 2,000 and a recognition certificate.

Kumar has been pursuing his PhD at the department on nutrition management of rice-chickpea production system in laterite soil.

“The research will help application of organic fertiliser such as vermicompost in right amount and timing, to rice crop so that the yield of rice-chickpea cropping system is increased by 10 per cent as compared to use of conventional synthetic fertilisers,” Kumar said.

Further, the organic fertilser application would improve the nutritional and cooking quality of rice grain and chemical and biological properties of the acid lateritic soil, he said.