Trading Desk Jobs for Dirt Roads: Why I Left a Corporate Career to Build Forest Side Farm?

The Question That Started It

For decades, the dominant migration story in Uttarakhand — and rural India generally — has run one direction: young people leave the village for the city in search of stable, well-paying corporate and IT careers. I was part of that story once. This post is about the less common, harder-to-explain decision to reverse it.

What Reverse Migration Actually Looked Like, in Practice

Before Kotabagh, my career was in IT project management in a foreign country. Leaving wasn't a single dramatic exit — it meant walking away from a predictable salary, good life style, a defined career ladder, and a professional identity I'd spent years building, in exchange for something with no guaranteed outcome.

Initial idea of quitting came in 2015 when my father was not keeping well. I felt an urgent need to be with my aging parents and look after them. Decision to build a homestay on a quiet patch of land with no existing hospitality track record came much later.

The hardest part wasn't the physical move. It was the identity shift — going from someone whose expertise was recognised and titled, to something unknown. I was returning to India after 14 years of working abroad, I had no clue what am I going to do? What career I would get into? What would be the source of income?

After scouring through various career possibilities I decided to try my hands on farming. Within few months I was someone learning construction timelines, farming cycles, and guest hospitality from scratch, often getting it wrong before getting it right.

What Building Forest Side Farm Actually Involved

The 2.5-acre organic food forest didn't exist when I arrived — it was built gradually, choosing what to plant based on what the land and local climate actually supported, not what looked good on paper. The guest rooms were designed with intentionally rustic, unfinished walls rather than a polished hotel look, partly out of aesthetic choice and partly because it matched the pace we wanted guests to slow down into.

Wood carving and pyrography — burning designs into wood by hand — became a genuine daily practice during this period, not a business feature added later. It gave a kind of quiet, repetitive focus that the transition needed.

The corporate project management background didn't disappear either — it got redirected. Instead of building project plans for a IT and Telecom solutions, the same skills went into building Forest Side Farm's own digital presence and, over time, into work that supports employment for families in the surrounding villages.

Is This Part of a Bigger Trend?

Reverse migration — professionals moving from cities back to rural India — has been documented as a real, growing pattern, particularly since the pandemic reshaped how people think about remote work and quality of life. This is one example of it, not a claim that it's easy or guaranteed to work for everyone who tries it.

Frequently Asked Questions

• What does it actually take to leave a corporate job and start a homestay business in rural India?

  Beyond capital, it requires tolerance for a long unpaid learning curve — construction, land management, hospitality, and marketing all have to be learned or relearned, often without the safety net of a stable salary during the transition.

  
  

• Is reverse migration to places like Uttarakhand a growing trend in India?

  Yes — it's been increasingly documented since the pandemic, as remote work and a re-evaluation of city-based careers made rural relocation more practical for some professionals. It remains a minority path, not a mainstream one.

  
  

• How does Forest Side Farm support the local Kotabagh community?

  Forest Side Farm support 4 local families directly and many more indirectly. Our four team members are the main bread earners of their families and they are employed with us since 2017. While working on our farm and farmstay they are also managing their own farm lands. We buy their produce as and when needed, increasing their family income.