As India enters the Kharif sowing season, there is renewed focus on boosting domestic oilseed production and reducing reliance on edible oil imports. In this context, the WhatsApp-based AI advisory service ‘Oilseeds Kisan Mitra’—developed by the ICAR-Indian Institute of Oilseeds Research (ICAR-IIOR), Hyderabad—is emerging as a powerful tool. This service delivers reliable, research-based information regarding oilseed cultivation directly to farmers’ mobile phones, anytime and in their own language.
This service was launched by the Secretary of DARE and the Director General of ICAR during the National Oilseeds Conference held in New Delhi on February 6, 2026. This initiative reflects ICAR’s commitment to leveraging digital technology to directly benefit the farming community. Through this initiative, any oilseed farmer in India can access free, reliable, and instant crop-related advice directly via WhatsApp—without needing to download any additional apps—since millions of farmers are already familiar with the platform.
Farmers can save the number +91 4024598180 as ‘Oilseeds Kisaan Mitra’ on WhatsApp and ask questions in any Indian language regarding groundnut, mustard, sesame, sunflower, soybean, niger, and other oilseed crops. This service is available free of charge, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Dr. R.K. Mathur, Director of the ICAR-Indian Institute of Oilseeds Research (IIOR), Hyderabad, stated that ‘Oilseeds Kisan Mitra’ is the first initiative of its kind—based on ICAR’s oilseed research—designed to reach every farmer in the country in their own language via a platform they already use. It integrates scientific information from ICAR-IIOR, NSRI, IIGR, IIRMR, and the PC-Unit (Sesame and Niger) with a multilingual AI agent on WhatsApp. (PIB)
