Suicides by Farmers

As the central government prepares to put together a package to address the phenomenon of suicides among farmers, EPW special issue examines the incidence of suicides, the proximate causes and the deep-rooted problems in agriculture.

The reasons for agrarian distress in lie in the conjunction of the changing nature of agriculture and democratic politics. The internal differentiation along caste and class lines that the farming community of Punjab has experienced during the green/post-green revolution periods has weakened its position in regional and national politics.

The Vidarbha farmer is faced with yield, price, credit, income and weather uncertainties. The way out is to merge bold public policy initiatives with civil society engagement. Indebtedness is not new to rural Andhra Pradesh, while suicides due to indebtedness are. What forces farmers to take their lives is not the amount of debt per se, but the changed nature of agriculture involving high costs and low or negative returns. The following articles deals with these issues.

Political Economy of Agrarian Distress   --K C Suri
Beyond `Crises`   --Surinder S Jodhka
Farmers` Suicides in Maharashtra   --Srijit Mishra
Dimensions of Agrarian Distress in Andhra Pradesh   --K C Suri    --P Narasimha Rao
Analysis of Farmer Suicides in Kerala   --S MohanaKumar   --R K Sharma
Why Do Farmers Commit Suicide?   --V Sridhar
Suicide Mortality Rates across States of India, 1975-2001   --Srijit Mishra