-Down to Earth As corruption hijacks procurement centres in Bundelkhand, farmers prefer suicide to a debt trap. Richard Mahapatra reports from Uttar Pradesh with photographer Sayantoni Palchoudhuri A fatal paradox strikes Bundelkhand in the face—an overflowing wheat stock yet an overwhelming number of farmer suicides. Farmers here dread the government wheat procurement centre and the post-mortem house. In Orai, a small town in the Bundelkhand region of Uttar Pradesh, the two are...
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Village chief stuffs Dalit’s mouth with excreta in UP by Sanjay Pandey
In a shocking incident, a “pradhan” (village panchayat chief) and his supporters allegedly stuffed human excreta into the mouth of a Dalit youth in Uttar Pradesh’s Lalitpur district. According to a complaint registered with the police, the culprits, residents of Mailwara Khurd village in the district, also thrashed the youth and threatened him with dire consequences if he dared to approach the police. Police sources said that the youth had approached Chaliraja,...
More »Climate change threat to food produce in India, says study by Indrajit Bose
'Erratic rainfall and rising input costs forcing farmers to migrate' “Unable to clear a loan of Rs 2 lakh, my son committed suicide. I had to sell my ancestral house and cattle to repay the loan,” says Lakshmi Devi, 48, of Pathakotha Cheruvu village in Andhra Pradesh’s Anantapur district. Devi's woes did not end with the repayment of loan. Managing her farm is becoming increasingly difficult, partly because it is expensive,...
More »No Bundle Packs Here by Anuradha Raman
Farmer suicides are endemic, who knew? Chances are no one’s heard about Azad’s death in Bachlapur village though Lalitpur, where the Congress, the BSP and the SP are in a battle for votes, is only 15 km away. Farmer suicides aren’t an election plank and parties prefer trading corruption charges. Rahul Gandhi’s much-touted Bundelkhand development authority proposal remains just that. More than 500 committed suicide in the Bundelkhand region last...
More »Whither Bundelkhand package? by Aarti Dhar
“It never reached anywhere except in the pockets of the officers, contractors” “Bundelkhand package? It never reached anywhere except in the pockets of the officers and contractors.” This is the standard reply one gets on queries over the ambitious Rs. 7,266 crore special package announced by the Planning Commission for this backward drought-prone region of Uttar Pradesh. Announced in 2009, the package was meant for the overall development of the region spread...
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