Aiming to create awareness among people about the worst agrarian crises driving farmers to suicide in the state, Telangana government has drafted in prominent sports personalities to be ‘Farm Ambassadors’.
Tennis ace Sania Mirza, shuttler Jwala Gutta and cricketer Pragyan Ojha have agreed to help the families of farmers who have committed suicide due to mounting debts and crop failures.
As Sania is away in China to play a tournament, her mother Naseema Mirza gave a cheque for Rs 3 lakh to TRS MP and Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter K Kavitha who runs the NGO “Telangana Jagruthi.”
“Agriculture forms the core of our country’s economy. We must come forward to help our farmers who are going through a crises,” Naseema said.
Presenting Rs 1 lakh, Jwala Gutta said: “I’ve been hearing about farmer suicides for a long, long time. It is time for us to come together.”
Ojha said he decided to help the farmers after seeing their plight. “We will do our bit as citizens of Telangana and India,” the spinner said.
As ‘Farm Ambassadors’ the sports persons are required to draw the public attention to the farmers’ plights.
“Some NRIs have come forward to adopt 70 families of the farmers. The state government is doing everything possible to help the farmers but it is also the responsibility of every section of the society to contribute,” said Kavitha whose NGO has come forward to support the widows and children of the farmers who had committed suicide.
Meanwhile, the state cabinet has decided to increase compensation for farmers’ suicide deaths from Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 6 lakh. Deputy Chief Minister K Srihari said the revised compensation would come into effect from September 19. Official estimate suggests that 430 farmers have committed suicide in the last one year, of which 141 have been found eligible for compensation in accordance with the government's criteria.
However, opposition parties claimed that over 1,000 farmers killed themselves in the last one year and accused the TRS government of failing to rescue them.
Realisation of statehood, the magic wand expected to change the agrarian crises for the better, failed to stem the growing number of suicides, while loan waiver, a key TRS poll promise, could not have an impact either.
Experts say failure of both Kharif and Rabi crops coupled with the mounting debts triggered large-scale suicides of farmers in the state.