Maharashtra Farmer Who Died by Suicide Was Wearing T-Shirt With BJP Symbol, Slogan on It
The Wire Staff
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New Delhi: A little over a week before Maharashtra goes to polls, a farmer in Buldhana allegedly died by suicide by hanging himself from a tree on Sunday, reported NDTV.
The farmer was, notably, wearing a t-shirt with the Bhartiya Janata Party’s symbol on it. The text below it read, “Punha aaluya aaple sarkar (Let’s bring our government to power again).”
According to the report, a debt of over Rs 2 lakhs had led the 35-year-old farmer, Raju Gyandare Talware, to take the extreme step.
“It is believed that Talware had run up debts. The truth will be known after a detailed probe. We have registered a case,” an official from the Shegaon rural police station told PTI.
The incident occurred on a day when Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis was in Buldhana to address campaign rallies.
#MahaJanadeshSankalp Sabha today in Jalgaon, where our Hon PM @narendramodi ji will address and guide all of us.
My 3 rallies in Buldhana district and 1 at Versova. pic.twitter.com/GEsBfc7j6l
Marathwada and Vidarbha are two regions in Maharashtra that have seen a large number of farmer suicides in the last two decades. Buldhana is in Yavatmal.
Recently, Fadnavis, who assumed office in 2009, pinned the blame of farmer suicides in these regions on Nationalist Congress Party leader Sharad Pawar.
“Farmer suicides are the sin of Sharad Pawar and his government in Maharashtra. It started and increased during your regime. Pawar is talking about farmer suicides in his rallies in Vidarbha. I want to ask him, who was in power in Maharashtra when farmers started committing suicides?” he said, according to NDTV.
Also watch: The Farm Widow: A Suicide and a Life Left Behind
However, this year until September, 704 farmers had died by suicide in the six districts of Vidarbha alone. District level committees determined that 228 of these were due to the farm crisis.
In 267 of the cases the committees are yet to adjudicate whether the suicide took place due to the farm crisis or whether other reasons were at play.
Buldhana alone saw 315 farmer suicides in 2018, according to a report in Times of India. As many as 120 of these have been attributed to the farm crisis, with decisions pending in the other cases.
Vidarbha and Marathwada suffer from chronic drought, which often leads to crop failure. In recent years, the delay in crop insurance payments under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana have exacerbated the problem. Farmers enter into cyclical debt as they take more loans to pay back the loans they had previously taken.
According to data from the National Crime Records Bureau, 3,33,398 farmers died by suicide in India between 1995 and 2016. For the last three years the government has not released data on farmers suicides, saying that it is yet to compile the data.
If you know someone – friend or family member – at risk of suicide, please reach out to them. The Suicide Prevention India Foundation maintains a list of telephone numbers they can call to speak in confidence. You could also accompany them to the nearest hospital.
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