By Ruma Dubey

While the State citizens enjoyed a leisurely Tuesday, celebrating ‘Maharashtra Day’, Ramdas Dhule, a cotton farmer from Vidarbha region ended his life.  He is not the only debt ridden farmer mourned by his family. Four other farmers in the same region committed suicide, simply due to rising debts and limited means to repay them.  In the past four months, 332 families have lost their sons, husbands and brothers as the cost of cotton cultivation has doubled but owing to the drought and lack of proper irrigation facilities, the yield has dropped to half. In December 2011, Maharashtra Government announced a relief aid for the farmers but as the months passed by, with no income in hand; these illiterate, poor and hardworking farmers finally ended their lives; their misery and debts now passed onto their grieving families.

The Maharashtra Govt, just a day before the state was to celebrate ‘Maharashtra Day’ announced that it was allowing cotton exports which had earlier been banned.  It stated that fresh registration for export would be allowed and the export situation would be reviewed on a fortnightly basis. A much needed succor to the suffering farmers of Vidarbha. But it came a tad too late. Over the past fortnight, 8 farmers have committed suicide in Vidarbha of which 5 perished within a span of one single day, ironically, Maharashtra Day.

For us living in the cities and following the markets, the news was essentially just about the cotton exports. We do read and watch news about the suicides and have come to equate Vidarbha with farmer suicides. We shake our heads in pity, feel sympathy for a moment and then move on to the next channel or the next news.  Yes, for us city dwellers, the Vidarbha suicides are another social issue which exists on the fringe but as it does not affect us directly, we are not too involved. It is just a piece of sad news. That’s all.

Unfortunately, the Govt at the Center also seems to think the same which is why it needed to be pressurized to lift the ban on cotton exports. As this is sadly, an occurrence every year, how come the govt was not proactive and did not take steps which could have prevented these deaths? Rahul Gandhi, with a lot of fanfare made his visit to the district and his famed meeting with Kalawati was a heartwarming story. But that’s what it remained – merely a story. Today, Kalawati remains depraved where poverty and grief continues to stalk her home.  

A study was conducted by K.Nagaraj of the Madras Institute of Development Studies wherein it is reported that there have been 8652 farmer suicides in Vidarbha between 2004 to 2011. The death of the farmer in turn affects the lives which were dependent on him and thus around 1.5 million families are today struggling for survival in the aftermath.

The Vidarbha Jan Aandolan Samiti has explained that these suicides are because of non-receipt of declared relief aid to the Vidarbha cotton even after lapse of four month and the sudden crash in cotton prices due on going stringent restriction on cotton exports. The Maharashtra Govt had declared, in Dec 2011, an aid of Rs.2000 crore to the cotton farmers in Vidarbha and till date, not a single paise has reached them. And to make matters worse, on 4th March the Govt imposed the cotton export ban.  Plus, the cost of production had risen and lower-than-expected selling price for cotton, with the ban on exports put the farmers in a bind. And this, in a nutshell is the reason for the start in the spate of farmer suicides in the district.  

On the part of the Govt, it justified the decision to ban cotton exports, saying that it was because the domestic cotton textile mills were complaining that they were finding it hard to compete with rivals in Bangladesh and Pakistan due to rising cotton prices in India. But thanks to the ban, cotton prices rose further in the export market. So is the Govt trying to correct its deficit woes by imposing this ban and artificially creating a shortage in the export market thus hiking prices?

Whatever be the reasons, political or economic, nothing can be more valuable than lives. Can lives of farmers be more important than that of textile mills procurement prices? The Govt also needs to value human life above all. Every human life is worth the same and worth saving.

Those in the stock market will probably shrug off this story as something which does not really concern them or their stocks directly. But can we afford such apathy and selfishness? We may not be able to do much in terms of saving their lives (many will click on the ‘Like’ tab on Facebook on some page which is committed to these farmers and feel they have done their bit) but we can at least try to understand their plight? These deaths are essentially about policies gone wrong and lack of any development in the field of agriculture. How can this not affect all of us?