Farmers Suicide

Friends. You all must be reading in newspapers and other social media about farmers committing suicide. This has become an ongoing phenomenon for last so many decades that every time you read, you feel so disgusted and start cursing the govt . Every two /three years govt announces loan waiver schemes but still, conditions are not improving.

This year in the Marathwada region in Maharashtra, which comprises eight districts of the state, it has been reported that 805 farmers committed suicide in the first 11 months.

In Maharashtra, despite two successive state govts effectively waiving farm loans, farmers’ suicide persists in these eight districts. Now as per state govt rules, the state govt gives some ex gratia payments to the families of farmers who committed suicide. Now of these 805 cases,84 were considered ineligible and 605 were considered eligible for ex gratia. In 115 cases, an investigation is going on to see if the suicide can be considered as a farmer’s suicide. In the year 2020, 773 farmers’ suicide were recorded in that area. In 2019, 937 farmers’ suicide were reported but it was found 176 were ineligible and 761 were eligible for ex gratia payments.

Farm activists have noted that there has been a lot of rain for two years in a row since the first loan waiver in 2017. Then came the Covid pandemic. For 4 years in a row, several lakh tones of crops, fruits, and vegetables died in the farms.

Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) govt took the reins in Nov 2019, and in Feb 2020 declared a waiver of farm loans of upto Rs 2 lacs. This amount was for loans offered between 1^st April 2015 and 31^st March 2020. The waiver was offered by the Mahatama Jyotirao Phule crop loan waiver scheme. It eventually catered to about 19 lacs farmers. The state exchequer spent Rs 24,00 Cr on the waiver, and the state govt claimed it had covered 85% of state farmers.

As per these figures, there are about 118 lacs farmers, in the state. According to the experts, a loan waiver is not cure   for the problem, it is just a superficial remedy. Farmers end up in debt and receive lower returns -what they originally intended. Making a minimum support price (MSP) mandatory will ease and solve the problem.

In this case excessive rainfall and pandemic had destroyed the crops for four years and, the loan waivers have largely been ineffective. Govt has waived thousands of crores of farm and crop loans, but they never took steps to encourage repayment of loans. The system is flawed.

If you go into reality, from the 118 lacs farmers in Maharashtra, how many of eligible for loan waiver, that nobody knows. From 118 lacs farmers, a considerable percentage of farmers must be quite rich as they hold big farm holdings. When the govt announces a general loan waiver then these rich farmers also get their loans waived off. From the so called rich farmers, the majority of them belonged to the political class, and who is going to check the credentials of these types of persons.

In every state including Maharashtra, this loan waiver scheme is announced every 3 or 4 years, which is generally beneficial to these politicians. In the open, everyone shouts for  MSP, but these politicians only put hurdles in the road to MSP. The reason is most of Mandis and Agricultural Produce Marketing Committees (APMC) are controlled by politicians, and they buy produce from farmers and then sell it at the higher margin to whole sellers, which in turn sell with their added margins to the retailers, and in this process , the price may rise by anywhere between four to ten folds.

In the end main problem is the farmer get lower price for their produce and it is the middle men who make money. In my opinion till so many middle men are there in the system, the farmers are going to suffer. It is only the MSP which can ease the problem. But the problem is no one is willing to change the system, the Modi govt tried to introduce the new farm laws, and there was wide spread agitation in northern India, and in the end govt repeal the laws.

So this problem of farmers suicide is going to persist, till the time the system of buying from farmers and selling to end users is modified drastically.

Waiting for your views on this blog.

Anil Malik

Mumbai, India

22^nd December 2021

THIS IS MY 200^TH BLOG OF THE YEAR 2021