-The Telegraph   Prakash Karat today said the spate of farmer suicides was the fallout of the “collapse’’ of the Mamata Banerjee government’s crop-procurement system and that it was “unfortunate’’ that cultivators were “suffering” within eight months of Trinamul coming to power. “The central committee expressed serious concern at the growing number of farmer suicides in Bengal. There are reports that 24 farmers have taken their lives. This reflects not only on the...

-The Hindu   While Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her government sought to downplay the fact that farmers were being forced to commit suicide in the State because of penurious conditions, Leader of the Opposition Surya Kanta Mishra said here on Monday that the Chief Minister keeps maintaining that nothing is wrong whenever anything construed as a criticism of her government is brought to her notice. Not in concurrence with claims that farmers...

-The Times of India   Rampant corruption in government-run welfare schemes, and not just indebtedness, was one of the major reasons behind farmers in Madhya Pradesh killing themselves, a high-level committee appointed by the state human rights commission has reported. After probing the more than 4000 farmer suicides in the state during the last few years, the two member committee comprising renowned agriculture expert G S Kaushal and retired sugar cane commissioner...

Two of the three Bengal agencies tasked with procuring paddy directly from farmers have failed to do so till now because of lack of funds, a revelation that blunts the state government’s attempt to blame the Centre. Paddy procurement is one of the purported issues over which the Congress and the Trinamul Congress have been calling each other names. The state government had pointed fingers at the Centre-run Food Corporation of...

The frequency of incidents of farmers committing suicides is “unimaginable” in West Bengal, State Left Front chairman Biman Bose said here on Friday.  “The government had fixed a target of 20 lakh metric tonnes for procurement of paddy from peasants in the State. According to reports, it has only collected 2 lakh metric tonnes so far,” Mr. Bose, who is also the State secretary of the CPI(M), told journalists.  Stating that paddy...