A natural soft drink sourced from local forest produce is giving Chhattisgarh's tribal women a refreshing means of livelihood.&nbsp;Dhamtari:&nbsp;Summers are here and temperatures are soaring, with the&nbsp;fierce heat leaving throats parched and bodies fatigued. In this tiny Chhattisgarh village,&nbsp;a traditional soft drink made from&nbsp;tikhur&nbsp;(commonly known as East Indian arrowroot or narrow-leaved turmeric)&nbsp;is not only providing relief&nbsp;from this scorching heat but has also come as a welcome means of employment for local tribal&nbsp;women.&nbsp;Tikhur&nbsp;is a forest produce found in and around the Sihawa mountain in&nbsp;​​Dhamtari district. In Dugali, it's found in/cultivated on around 25 hectares. Locals have been using the tuber for centuries for its cooling properties, incorporating it in&nbsp;halwa&nbsp;and&nbsp;thandai. It keeps the body cool and reduces the risk of heatstroke. Capitalising on this quality of&nbsp;tikhur, the women belonging to the Jagriti Balika Self Help Group (SHG) in Dugali village have&nbsp;started making and selling it as a soft drink mix, with the&nbsp;support of the&nbsp;Forest Department. The department buys the&nbsp;tuber at around Rs 20 per kg from locals and supplies it to the SHG.&nbsp;SHG member,&nbsp;Anju Mercam, 24, spoke to&nbsp;101Reporters&nbsp;about&nbsp;the making of these drinks, "First of all, the tubers that are brought from the forest are sorted to get&nbsp;the good quality ones, which are washed, cleaned and&nbsp;dried in the sun. After that, they are put in a crusher and the top layer is&nbsp;removed. They are then cut into small pieces and fed into another&nbsp;machine for grinding."“After grinding, it is put in mud pots where we attempt to extract all the white starch from it. In this&nbsp;process, the tuber is washed and filtered repeatedly from one pitcher to another. This is continued until absolutely no white starch is left in the tuber. The starch obtained&nbsp;is sun-dried in a&nbsp;wide-mouth pot and is then cut into shapes. This end-product&nbsp;is used in making the soft drinks which we call 'local cola',"&nbsp;Anju added. Every quintal of tuber (i.e 100 kg) yields 5 kg of starch.&nbsp;<div class="embed-container" align="center" style="line-height: 1.6;"><img src="https://assets.ramen.101reporters.com/inpic/2021/5/101RPT916585/tikhur_blocks.jpg" id="916622" title="" style="width: 100%;"></div>The final product is a starch powder obtained from tikhur. Picture credit: Devender YuvrajThis white powder, sold in the form of jaggery, is simply added to water to create a refreshing drink.&nbsp;Anju said that she earns 120 rupees&nbsp;a day by&nbsp;doing this work. This works out to up to 3000-3500 rupees a month, which is very useful for her and her&nbsp;family, she says.Kumari Thameswari Dhruv, assistant-in-charge of the SHG's processing centre, said&nbsp;that currently, a total of 20 women have been employed in the&nbsp;manufacturing process, working towards the&nbsp;"vocal for local" dream. While in the summer, the SHG manufactures this local cola, during the monsoon and winter,&nbsp;they make organic plates and bowls.&nbsp;Divya Kunjam, another member of the SHG, said apart from&nbsp;employment, the venture also provides a safe working environment for the local women, so that their&nbsp;families remain free from worrying about any security concerns. She thanked the forest department for this, saying&nbsp;the department has also given provided the SHG with some modern machines to help them scale up their&nbsp;production.KS Madhukar, Deputy Officer (Deputy Ranger), Dugali Forest Zone told&nbsp;101Reporters&nbsp;that&nbsp;this drink from Dugali has managed to carve out a distinct identity for itself in the entire state. He said,&nbsp;"The tuber found in the forests here has a very high amount of starch called&nbsp;Curcuma Angustifolia. The&nbsp;soft drink that is made from it is pure white and clean."&nbsp;He told that due to its unique colour, it commands a higher price in the market compared to drinks made from&nbsp;Tikhur&nbsp;grown in other places.&nbsp;At present, the cost of Dugali&nbsp;tikhur&nbsp;is Rs 1000 per kg.&nbsp;In order to take Dugali's&nbsp;tikhur&nbsp;drink and similar forest produce to the market,&nbsp;the Chhattisgarh State Small Forest Produce Association has opened a dedicated store in the state capital of&nbsp;Raipur which sells these forest produce and forest medicines.&nbsp;Apart from this, wholesalers can also procure the product from the Dugali processing centre itself.&nbsp;<div class="embed-container" align="center"><img src="https://assets.ramen.101reporters.com/inpic/2021/5/101RPT916585/tikhur.jpeg" id="916625" title="" style="width: 100%;"></div>The tikhur&nbsp;drink mix sold at a dedicated mart for tribal products at Raipur. (Picture credit: Devender Yuvraj)This year, 578 quintals of tuber were processed by the SHG who produced nearly 3,000 kg of the drink mix.&nbsp;Of this,&nbsp;70% goes to the Raipur mart,&nbsp;24% is sold at the Dhamtari Dhanvantari Mart and 6% is sold locally. The SHG gets 6% of the total income generated. The rest is shared between the various marts and the forest department.&nbsp;Anil Kumar Verma, Chief Forest Officer of the Dugali forest zone, says that this 'local cola' is loved&nbsp;not only by the local people but also by the soldiers deployed in these Naxal-hit areas.&nbsp;He said, "The brave soldiers of our country carry this drink during their patrols. It is a matter of pride for us to be quenching the thirst&nbsp;of the soldiers engaged in protecting Bastar and the country."