Killing fields

Have Maharashtra’s farmer suicides become a blind spot for the state? It’s not as if the crisis is unsolvable

Yet another farmer died by suicide in Maharashtra last week. Kaila­­sh Arjun Nagare (43) was a farmer activist in Vidarbha, fighting for irrigation coverage of 14 villages. He was on a 10-day hunger strike last year. Maharashtra has been the epicentre of India’s farmer crises. But lessons are never learnt, although the scale of the tragedy and reasons for it have been clear for over a quarter of a century. 

Between Jan 2015 and March 2019, Maharashtra alone witnessed 12,616 farmer suicides. By 2023, it’s estimated, seven farmers daily were taking their own lives in the state. The greater tragedy is that farmers’ protests and policy wonks remain centred on the triad of MSP, loan waivers and dizzying numbers of schemes from which those small/medium farmers who most need the govt infra – irrigation to seed to storage – seem to slip out of coverage. Meanwhile, real threats to farmers’ income have multiplied. 

Take irrigation. Just 20% of Maharashtra has irrigation coverage – that means 80% farming is dependent on rains. Prosperous western Maharashtra (where sugarcane, wheat, grapes are grown) has canal coverage while Vidarbha, Marathwada that grow water-intensive cotton, soybean, pulses, apart from millets – remain neglected with barely 10-12% coverage. For farmers heavily dependent on rainfed farming, droughts play havoc, while areas with borewells steadily deplete groundwater reserves that erratic rainfall cannot replenish. 

Climate change, water scarcity, rising input costs (seeds, fertilisers, irregular supply of even “free power”, labour), deficient monsoons, market volatility,  limited storage capacities – these hit all but the top tier of big farmers. None of these are insurmountable challenges. But all govts have on offer are debt waivers. Farmers’ incomes can be shored up by efficient water management and adoption of less water-intensive tech. Micro-irrigation projects clearly aren’t reaching farms in Vidarbha and Marathwada effectively. A desperate hunger strike in 2024 by one farmer wasn’t enough to catch govt attention. Contrast this with the alacrity of govt response to hunger strikes by quota activist Jarange Patil.

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