When Farmers die....

My grandfather took care of a family of 12 using 45 acres of land, 1 bore well and a lot of hard work.
Flash to today …….the acres remain the same, hard work is replaced by more hard work, prosperity replaced by drought and the farmers no longer harvest income …they harvest Death.

Crushed by circumstances beyond their control the life of the Indian farmer and his family has turned highly fragile. To add to all this, this year brought with it reports of hunger death. One more bad season and a lot more than the food providers would be lost, we would lose their trust and faith.

Twenty-five thousand farmers have committed suicide under these circumstances since 1997. In the state of Andhra Pradesh alone, 4,500 farmers have committed suicide in the past seven years. This does not include the number of family members of farmers who have also killed themselves. Things are not so bad as they may seem …..they are Worse.

The result of years of onslaught from all fronts…faulty seeds, the green revolution that rendered the soil useless, move from food crops to cash crops, government policies, lack of subsides, lack of transportation, lack of direct selling opportunities, poor rains, steady erosion of local democratic system, worsening rural employment, collapse of the agriculture credit and finance systems have pushed the farmers to protest….an ultimate protest against a society that shows no concern.

As citizens we need to show more concern and protest against the injustice met. The recent move by the Maharashtra government to provide the effected families with top bred cows is a step towards more destruction. what the farmers need is not another mouth to feed but more reliable seeds, subsidies, better logistics, guarantee of employment.

The only ray of hope is the involvement of corporate's…… for a lesser exploitation is better than complete destruction.