Apples vs. Pills

A single drug company makes more than all of Kashmir’s farms combined. The gap shows how fragile the valley's economy has become.

- Irshad Mushtaq

Sun Pharma was born in 1983 with a handful of products and two salesmen. Four decades later, it has become India’s biggest pharmaceutical giant, earning more than 52,000 crore a year. Its profits alone, 15,000 crore, outstrip the entire agricultural income of Kashmir.

That contrast is hard to ignore.

Agriculture here supports 3.5 million people. Orchards, fields, and walnut groves are central to life in the valley. Yet all that work generates about 11,000 crore a year, less than what one company produces in profits with a workforce of 43,000.

This imbalance says a lot about where Kashmir stands.

Farming still employs nearly 70 percent of the population, but its share in the region’s economy has fallen from 28 percent fifteen years ago to 20 percent today.

Families may still depend on apples and pears, but the sector’s weight is shrinking, and the income it creates is far from enough.