Kerala’s Vidarbha lives in debt, despair

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared war on rural indebtedness after a two-day tour of Vidarbha on Saturday, it was another hard day for Annakkutty. The old woman in Wayanad district of Kerala has seen both her sons committing suicide in the last few months after suffering huge losses.

Wayanad is fast changing into a world of widows. The district dominates Kerala's death register, a striking parallel to Vidarbha. About 1500 farmers committed suicide in the last five years, unable to face their creditors.

The hilly areas cultivating tea, coffee, cardamom, ginger and pepper has suffered the most as the agrarian economy began to crumble from the 1990s. In recent years, with the drought and subsequent crop loss, there was a dip of up to 45 per cent in the total agricultural produce.

One of the first declarations of chief minister VS Achuthanandan, who came to power on a pro-poor, pro-rural plank, was to waive the loans of those farmers who had committed suicide. But even the government doesn't know how many farmers have ended their life. Unofficial data says more than 1500 succumbed to the agricultural crisis.