Lately, India has seen a rise in the suicide of framers and daily wage earners. Over the past six years, the suicide rate among farmers and daily wage workers has increased considerably.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), as many as 42,480 farmers and daily wage workers died as per the research made in 2019, and that increased by 6% from the previous year. The agriculture sector might have seen positive growth in the economy during the covid-19 hit year but it witnessed more suicides compared to 2019.
Cases have doubled to 23.4% last year as compared to the last six years, which accounts for one in every four farmers and daily wage workers. According to NCRB data, on accidental deaths and suicide, 10,281 farmers committed suicide in 2019, down from 10,357 in 2018, whereas the figure for daily wage workers went up to 32,559 from 30,132.
The suicide rate in the farming sector accounted for 7.4% of the total suicides in the country. And if we look at the daily wage workers’ suicide numbers, then it totaled up to 1 lack, recorded by one agency in 2019. In 2014, the suicide rate of daily wage workers was 12% which gradually rose to 17.8% in 2015, 19.2% in 2016, 22.1% in 2017, 22.4% in 2018, and 23.4% in 2019.
India is an agrarian country and around 70% of people are directly or indirectly dependent on agriculture. But farmers’ suicide in India is a very dangerous issue and could be a very serious matter in the coming years.
Some scholars assumed that the main reason for farmers’ suicides could be attributed to both natural and manmade factors such as monsoon failure, climate change, as well as high debt burdens, government policies, mental health, personal issues, and family problems.
Other than that, there are a few reasons which are responsible for the suicides. A major cause is an increasing burden on farmers due to the inflated prices of agricultural inputs. For instance, for wheat, the cost at present is three times higher than it was in 2005. Then the other reason is the cost of chemicals and seeds. Fertilizers, crop protection chemicals, and even the seed for farming and cultivation have become expensive.
The cost of agricultural equipment is also one of the reasons. The input cost, moreover, is not limited to the basic raw materials. Using agricultural equipment and machinery like tractors, submersible pumps, etc. adds more to the surging costs. Sometimes labor costs are also responsible for it as hiring laborers and animals are getting too costlier nowadays.
According to NCRB data, 2474 suicides out of the studied 3000 farmer suicides in 2015, the victims had unpaid loans from the local banks. Even, 9.8% were loaning from money lenders. Thus, the pressure of muscle power of moneylenders could be far from being a major driving force. Therefore, it can be said that they might be stressed due to loans. Other reasons would be the direct integration with the market, lack of awareness, and because of that small farmers are not able to know about the positives of government policies.
In one interview, India’s leading mental health expert said: “In this economy of ours, with jobs increasingly disappearing, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that daily wage workers are committing suicide at this rate”. The main reason for their suicide is a lack of employment opportunities because 10 years ago it was easy to find work and at that time economy was growing. But today the construction industry, which happens to be the most common employer of the daily wage worker, is evaporating. Therefore, we are seeing a constant increment in the suicide of daily wage workers.