Door-to-door and village-to-village surveys carried out by researchers of the Department of Economics and Sociology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana detected a total of 9,291 suicides that were committed by farmers in six districts of Punjab during the period from 2000 to 2018. Situated in the Malwa region of Punjab, which is known for cotton farming and the prevalence of cancer among its population, Sangrur (2,506) witnessed the highest number of...

-TheWire.in A recent report on farmer suicides in Punjab reveals the circumstances which lead farmers and farm labourers to take their own lives, debunks popular myths regarding the same, and points to policy measures needed to tackle the problem. Suicides are a sign of a deep crisis in a society. And in Punjab’s so-called ‘agriculturally developed society’, suicides of farmers and farm labourers have been taking place unabated for the last two...

-Newsclick.in Answers to all the questions you are likely to have about the Minimum Support Price and the controversy surrounding it. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s hope that his promise to repeal the three new farm laws will have the protesting farmers to promptly fold their tents and leave Delhi has been belied. The farmer unions have instead declared that they are not going to call off their one-year stir until the Union...

-Financial Express Sukhpal Singh, professor and former chairperson, Centre for Management in Agriculture at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad underlined the point that the problems of the agriculture sector cannot be resolved by the repeal of the laws per se. The Friday morning announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of his government’s decision to begin the process to repeal the three contentious farm laws have been generally hailed though some...

The increase in the total number of suicides committed in India during 2020 in comparison to the previous years has hit the headlines recently. While some media commentators have stated that the economic distress (caused by job loss, income loss, failure of business, and growing hunger, among other things) in 2020 could have led to more suicides being committed, others have said that home isolation and deteriorating mental health (associated...