The deceased include Waman Awari, Vijay Dandage, Dhyaneshwar Choudhari (all from Yavatmal district), Prabhakar Wakte (Akola), Ladhu Madavi (Chandrapur), Bhiagirath Pathorkar (Amravati) and Raju Lahorkar (Washim district).
According to Kishor Tiwari of the Vidarbha Jan Andolan Samiti (VJAS) which has been documenting farmers’ suicide in Vidarbha, attributed the extreme step taken by the farmers to the heavy crop loss and ‘failure’ of Bt cotton in over six million acres. Another reason for the farmers’ despodency, he claimed, is the crisis arising out of the delay in cotton procurement.
Tiwari has alleged that the Central government was under pressure from textile lobby to bring down the raw cotton prices vis-Ã -vis the high international rates and hence was not opening cotton procurement centres in Vidarbha.
The news of a bumper cotton crop and skyrocketing prices was far different from the ground reality.
On an average, a cotton farmer spends about Rs 30,000 per acre and may get a maximum yield of about four quintal.
This doesn’t even puts him in a position to break even and hence the farmers are under perennial economic strain, he claimed.