The story of how a tired chemical-fed field in Theni became a certified organic farm stay that families drive across the state to reach.
In the early nineties this land was farmed the way everyone farmed — more urea every season, and less to show for it each year. Dr. Sarav, then a young physician, watched his father spend more on inputs than the harvest returned, and began reading about soil the way he had read about medicine.
The switch to organic in 1998 cost the family three lean years. What came back afterwards was not just yield — it was earthworms, kingfishers, sweet well water and neighbours asking how it was done. Guests started arriving to see it, and the farm stay grew out of simply feeding them.
Dr. Sarav still does his hospital rounds three days a week and farms the rest. His conviction is simple: what a family eats for a weekend here should be traceable to a field they can walk to, and children should meet a cow before they meet a carton of milk.
Four commitments we hold ourselves to, and publish so guests can hold us to them too.
Contour bunds, three recharge pits and a farm pond mean the monsoon stays on our land instead of running off it.
Cattle feed the compost, compost feeds the crops, crop waste feeds the cattle. Almost nothing leaves the farm as rubbish.
A quarter of the farm is left uncultivated for native trees, nesting birds and the bees we depend on.
Every person working here lives within four kilometres, is paid year round, and their children's schooling is supported by the farm.
We publish our numbers each year because organic claims are easy to make and harder to prove. These are the 2025 figures, verified as part of our organic certification audit.
You will meet all of them within an hour of arriving.
Physician three days a week, farmer the rest. Leads the sunrise walk and will happily talk soil biology until lunch.
Decides the day's menu by walking the field first. Her banana-leaf lunches are why guests extend their stay.
Thirty years on this land. Knows every tree by name and the exact week each one fruits.
Runs the children's farm activities, the village tour and the evening camp fire.
Grandfather buys 12 acres of dry land outside Theni and plants the first mango saplings.
The family stops all chemical inputs. Three hard years follow before the soil recovers.
The farm receives full organic certification and adds cattle, poultry and composting.
Two rooms are opened to visiting families who kept asking to see the farm.
Traditional cottages are built in mud, lime and wood by village masons.
Eighteen acres, six cottages, and a waiting list every harvest season.
A working organic farm stay in the Tamil countryside, where families wake to birdsong, walk barefoot through paddy fields and eat what the soil gave that morning.
Harvest news, seasonal recipes and quiet weekend openings — once a month.
© 2026 Dr. Sarav’s Maaya Farms · An organic family farm stay in Theni, Tamil Nadu · Built with love for the land