Between January and March this year, 622 farmers had committed suicide in Maharashtra.
Even though farmer Gajendra Singh’s suicide grabbed headlines but the suicide of another peasant Harshu Jatav from Alwar didn’t get adequate coverage from media. Singh’s suicide was discussed on social media forums and parliament but nobody bothered to debate about Jatav. Politicians always raise farmer suicide issues to derive political mileage but none of them are able to resolve this issue. Every party claims to champion the cause of farmers but the ground reality is very different as many of them end their lives due to crop failure.
The scenario is no different in Maharashtra where political scores are settled over farmer suicide issue. Even though the Fadnavis government had given assurances but farmers suicides continue to occur in the state. According to government records, 422 farmers had committed suicide last year expressing their inability to bear crop losses and a financial quandary made acute by water scarcity and an agrarian crisis.
The Congress had demanded the resignation of Maharashtra Agriculture Minister Eknath Khadse for submitting “false information” to Centre on the number of farmers having killed themselves owing to unseasonal rains and hailstorm in the state. Khadse had said there were only three cases of suicides by farmers due to the natural disasters while the total number of farmers who committed suicide was 601 this year.
“Between January and March, 622 farmers had committed suicide including 448 in Vidarbha region, which is the highest. The state government has not provided any relief to the farmers who have suffered crop loss due to unseasonal rains and hailstorm but provided false information to the Centre that only three farmers had committed suicide,” said the Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Assembly Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil.
On the other hand, netizens criticised Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for the farmer Gajendra Singh’s suicide at AAP rally. According to them, the AAP had stage-managed the suicide incident for garnering political mileage by targeting the Modi government.
Gopalakrishna M @gklmarali
For attain political ambition these dirty political parties kill any one. This is Indian history since 1947
Umesh Raizada @uraizadaa
Shame on AAP Kumar Ashutosh Arvind and Other. Shameless AAP
krishna kumar shukla @krishnakkshukla
It was stage managed program of AAP with last minute save promise but cheated him.
@56perumal
It was fixed. Period. only Qs that remains whether attempted stunt was at behest of d Great Kejriwal or his cronies
sanjay jha @sanju9213
mujhe bhi yahi lagta hai stunt ke chakkar main jaan gava baitha
Gajendra’s uncle Rajendra Singh said, “He climbed the tree only to grab attention. Can you seriously believe a man would climb a tree in front of so many people and commit suicide? I can’t believe that not one person tried to save him.”
