89 Gujarat farmers committed suicide in last four years: Government

GANDHINAGAR: Gujarat agriculture department today said that 89 farmers committed suicide in the state in the last four years, while claiming that crop failure was not the reason behind the extreme step in any of the cases.

"As many as 89 farmers have committed suicide in the state from 2010 to July 31, 2014, while none of them committed suicide due to crop failure," Agriculture Minister Babu Bokhiria said in a written reply to a question in the state Assembly.

The agriculture department has made four categories of reasons with regard to the farmers' suicides, including crop failure, increase of agricultural debt, increase of (other) debt and other reasons.

Notably, as many as 78 farmers committed suicide due to 'other reasons', while only eight took the extreme step due to increase of debt, he said in the reply.

Only three farmers ended their lives due to increase of agricultural debt, while none of them committed suicide due to crop failure, he said.

As per the figures released today by the state government in response of a query of Congress MLA Tejshree Patel from Viramgam seat, the state's Saurashtra region has the worst conditions for farmers as the maximum number of suicides have been reported from there.

The Jamnagar district of Saurashtra witnessed maximum 46 suicides by the dejected farmers. Two other districts in Saurashtra, Junagadh and Amreli, registered 14 and seven suicides respectively by farmers in four years, said the figures.

Rajkot registered five such fatalities, whereas Kutch reported three such cases in the same time span, it said.

Two cases each of farmers' suicides were registered in Bhavnagar and Porbanadar districts of Saurashta region.

The South Gujarat's Dang tribal district reported three suicides by farmers, while one case each was registered in Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar, Mehsana, Surendranagar, Vadodara, Narmada and Surat districts.