Farmers Suicides.

Most of the people in India are engaged in agricultural sector. It also means that the livelihood of farmers are depend upon many natural factors of the environment i.e. climate land relief and soil.

The history

In India, the problems of farmers came to light in 1990 when the period of liberalization started. An important English-language newspaper, The Hindu started publishing reports of farmers committing suicides in its newspaper in that year. The initial reports came from Maharashtra where in Vidarbha region; a cotton farmer had committed suicide. Thereafter, the newspaper also published similar reports of farmers’ suicides coming from Andhra Pradesh.

Reading these report, initially the people thought it was the problem of Vidarbha and its surrounding areas only and only the local government of that particular area was required to pay attention to the situation. However, when the emerging figures were monitored carefully, the situation was found to be worst. The horrible fact which came to light was that along with the farmers of Vidarbha, the farmers from Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, including other states in the country were found doing suicides.

The most critical aspect of all this was that apart from small farmers, medium and large farmers had also committed suicide. According to the statistics, in the year 2009, total 17,368 farmers committed suicide and on an average the annual rate of farmers committing suicide is being recorded as 10,000 per annum currently.

The timely onset of the monsoon bodes well for the economy. Indeed the monsoon was making rapid progress and was ahead of its second schedule over the west coast at the time of going to press the rainfall has been 17% higher than normal. But the situation can be turned which become a problem for the farmers which leads to many life-threatening issues. Basically it refers to the National catastrophe of farmers committing suicide since 1990s. There are many reasons behind this for instance inability to repay loans mostly taken from banks to purchase expensive seeds and fertilisers.

In an yearly average over 1,40,000 people commit suicide out of which 84,000 of farmers however the highest number of suicides are in 2004 of 18,241.

There are many other reasons behind this alarming issue which results in many suicides were of this is government economic policy which favours LPG and become the root cause of farmer suicide. Other reason behind this is genetically modified crops. Misdirection of government subsidies and funds are kind of monopoly for upper middle section people.Most of the money get blocked there andunable to reach to farmers. Droughts and pre-monsoon is leads to suicide idea to the farmers.

Now the question arises, what is the solution? Approximately 17% in national gross domestic product and 22% of total population in agriculture sector this is really important for the country's growth

Following are some of steps:

1) farmer must be educated about modern farming.

2) The interest rates need to be made available, human rights must be respected.

3) Recently announced Pradhan Mantri Farmer Bima Yojana is a step in the right direction inspite of some disadvantages, these schemes are doing great.

4) Other things which we individually can do is not to waste food and water. We should also aware our friends and family. Do co-operate with the government to save for our country and ourselves.

Conclusion: The issue of farmers committing suicide has now become a national problem. If this situation is not controlled early, it will get out of the hand. For the farmers it is urgently required to offer them high support prices as well as crop insurance. High support price for their crops is also required besides making available easy credit for themselves. These are the only ways through which the situation of farmers can be improved and they may be prevented from committing suicide.