The Fertile Earth

A thrilling story of love and resistance about two young people pulled together across lines of caste, set against the tumultuous political backdrop of 20th century India


1969: In a remote field in Irumi, a tiny village nested deep within the ghats and jungles of Hyderabad, a small boy witnesses a shocking act of vengeance. India is changing, and with it the undisputed dominance of the aristocratic Deshmukh family. 


A decade earlier, the Deshmukh daughters, Vijaya and Sree, set out with Krishna and Ranga, the sons of a servant in the parents' household, in search of the tiger rumoured to be circling Irumi. The consequences of this terrible day will explode through each of their young lives, sending them scattering for different corners of India. But when the Marxist, ultra-left Naxalite movement triggers violent uprisings throughout the countryside, they find themselves irresistibly drawn back towards one another and their childhood home in Irumi.