Wild And Nutritious

Gaithi, a tuber variety that grows in the hills of Uttarakhand, has both nutritive and medicinal properties

- Megha Prakash

AT A stall in this year’s Himanya Saras Mela, Uttarakhand’s annual festival held in Dehra-dun every November to promote local products, I found people buying an unusual looking tuber. One of the customers told me that it is called gaithi and is consumed in the winters for warmth. Stall owners Rakesh Joshi and his wife Kiran from Haldwani district say they are surprised with the tuber’s popularity. “We have been putting up a stall here since 2015. This is the first time we got 80 kg of gaithi. We are now left with just 20 kg,” says Joshi, adding that he is selling it for 100 a kg.

In the hills of Uttarakhand, the tuber grows wild at a height of 150 to 2,100 metres. But unlike other tubers, it is a climber that hangs in the air and is therefore commonly called air potato or yam.