A tribal farmer from Wayanad died this week at 74. In his old mud house, he kept more than 60 traditional rice varieties alive. His name was Cheruvayal Raman. People called him Ramettan. He belonged to the Kurichya tribe in Wayanad, Kerala. When he was 17, his uncle died, and the family's traditional rice seeds came to him. Wayanad once had around 160 native rice varieties. Most of them have disappeared. He grew each old variety in its own small plot. Every year he harvested it, dried the seeds, and stored them in his mud house for the next season. He stopped using chemical fertiliser in 1978. He said the earthworms came back after that. It cost him around Rs 70,000 a year. Some years, his family lived on ration rice. When other farmers came asking, mostly tribal families, he gave them seeds without taking money. In 2023, he got the Padma Shri. Kerala Agricultural University made him a professor of practice. He once said, "Don't call me a hero. Make sure the seeds survive. That is enough."