In Vidarbha: agrarian distress, playing on the mind
The second round of sowing doubles the basic production cost, but one hopes for a harvest that would still deliver returns. Most of the time, it doesn’t. “In one bad season,” says Vijay “we’d lose anywhere between 50,000 to 75,000 rupees.” Climate change has led to variations in temperature and precipitation, reducing farm income by 15-18 per cent for irrigated areas, according to the OECD’s Economic Survey of 2017-18 . The losses, the survey states, could be as high as 25 per cent in non irrigated areas.
The perpetual feeling of being on tenterhooks and the eventual loss have triggered a mental health crisis among farmers in the region, which is already known for extreme agrarian distress and an alarming number of farmer suicides.
In India, close to 11,000 farmers ended their lives in 2021, and 13 per cent of them were from Maharashtra, says the National Crime Records Bureau . The state continues to have the highest share of people who died by suicide in India.
— source ruralindiaonline.org | Parth M.N. | Mar 24, 2023