Abstract: Children and Youth in Crisis: The Experiences of Children of Farmers who Committed Suicide in India

Abstract

Most developing countries have adopted neo-liberal policies since the late 1980s, in the hope of accelerating development. This has been accompanied by a clear shift in the approach of the state to agriculture and rural development. A large section of the population in these countries, however continue to be rural and dependent on agriculture and allied activities for sustenance and do not have access to formal sector credit. From a strategy that was predominantly supply-led and characterised by directed credit programmes to the sector, there has been a shift towards market oriented approach characterised by interest rate deregulation and reduction in subsidies. At the same time, there is also talk of the need for greater financial inclusion and outreach as a precondition for accelerating growth and reducing income disparities and poverty. The Indian experience has been in line with this. There are a number of dimensions to the shift in policy in India since the early 1990s: investment in agriculture came down; banking sector reforms were introduced reducing directed credit to agriculture; agricultural subsidies were withdrawn and as a consequence, cost of production increased; external trade liberalisation exposed farmers to price volatility; and price support services provided by the state were withdrawn. All this has led to slowing down and stagnation in agricultural growth, affecting the income and employment of a large number of rural people dependent on agriculture. An acute manifestation, of the shift in the policy towards agriculture in India has been the phenomenon of farmers committing suicides. During the period 2001-05, 86,922 farmers are reported to have committed suicide. The suicide mortality rate (SMR, suicide deaths per 100,000 persons) for male farmers increased from 12.3 in 1996 to a peak of 19.2 in 2004, and declined marginally to 18.2 in 2005, coinciding with the period of the agrarian crisis (Government of India, 2007) . The phenomenon is continuing. According to another report, about 2.16 lac farmers committed suicide between 1997 and 2009 (Sainath 2010). The state of Maharashtra in India and eastern Maharashtra or the Vidarbha region in particular is one of the epicenters of the agrarian crisis. It is in fact part of the semi-arid rainfed farming belt across which the problem prevails. The main reasons highlighted for the problem are – pre-existing conditions of very high vulnerability of the region, acute agrarian crisis as a consequence of the neoliberal policies and absence of alternate livelihood opportunities, particularly for the poor, during the period of agrarian crisis in this region. Impact on the Children of the Farmers who Commit Suicide. A majority of the farmers committing suicide are in their thirties and forties and they leave behind young widows and children and aged parents. The tragedy has tremendous psychological impact on the children of these farmers, who are overnight made to grow up and take on responsibilities beyond their age. Education is the first calamity in the face of such crises. In some cases, the older children especially the boys are forced to drop out of school and attend to farming the land. With practically no knowledge of what they have to do, they are thrust into adult life and faced with the mantle of taking care of their younger siblings. Girls face the pressure of dropping out and lending a hand at house work and also working as farm labour. The M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation, India, piloted an initiative to support the education of the school going children in the farmer suicide affected families in one district of the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra in 2006. The paper will present some of the cases of these children and how their lives were forced to change due to the crisis.