A fresh perspective on farm suicides

For those who have wondered whether indebtedness can be the sole factor driving farmers to take their lives, here is a book that introduces much needed nuance and complexity to the debate. Nilotpal Kumar’s book, based on a study of 22 suicide cases in Ananthapur district (accompanied by a fascinating ethnographic study of a village which he uses as his control group) argues that while the economic crisis in agriculture is a significant factor, the role of other socio-cultural forces should not be discounted. The book does not underplay the agrarian economic crisis. By according due importance to the economic, social, and cultural, and by projecting the crisis as a multi-layered one, the book steers clear of becoming a fanciful, post-modernist tract — which its title ‘egotism and masculinity in peasant life’ may inadvertently end up conveying.

Anantapur district, historically an agriculturally backward region, has seen more “farmers’ suicides” (a terminology that links farming to economic causes) than other regions in Andhra Pradesh — a State which along with Karnataka, Maharashtra and Gujarat have recorded more suicides than elsewhere. Its crisis is linked to the unviability of groundnut cultivation on dry land “even in a normal monsoon year”. It is remarkable that monocropping of groundnut, or rather, commoditised farming as opposed to growth of cereals, has been a feature of Anantapur since the British days.

Reduced pest-resistance has impacted yields, hurting small farmers all the more. When the Government began promoting horticulture, stressed small farmers took to it as well, showing no ‘risk-aversion’ whatsoever – hence, migrating out of farming to urban jobs does not seem to have been exercised as an option, as in other distress-hit areas.

However, citrus farming required investing in borewells, which is nothing short of a gamble. Citrus farms take five years to break even, but the returns thereafter seem to be good enough to spur the risk-takers, whether large, medium or small farmers. The “per acre gross returns from citrus is at least 60-70 per cent higher than those that most profitable farms obtain from double-cropped high yield groundnut, not to speak of dry groundnut crop.”

Interestingly, the book argues, informal credit has not been a singularly oppressive force for peasants — rates in the region of 18-24 per cent cannot be termed usurious. This marks a break from the existing assumptions on this subject. However, it becomes difficult for small farmers to bear higher investments costs per acre. A “precarious groundwater regime” also punishes small and marginal farmers who entered the citrus game after the rest.

The borewell rush began after 2000. While “widening access to landownership in recent decades has intensified the rush for groundwater, it is the owners of middle and large holdings who have benefited the most in the process.” Given that the “share of expenditure on failed borewell attempts ranged between 30 to 48 per cent of all capital expenditure”, and that “the failed attempts are three time as high as successful ones” it is only natural that the smaller farmers are more vulnerable, even as some of them manage to strike it rich.

Therefore, for Anantapur district as a whole, farmers owning less than five acres account for over half the suicide cases, while those holding between five and 10 acres account for another third. A caste-wise break-up shows that both the dominant agriculturists and the other backward caste Kurubas account for a large share of suicides, “preponderantly male”.

The book rightly points out that with higher public investment in irrigation and a better seed support and extension network for horticulture, this mess could have been averted. It also underscores the high stakes game that commodified agriculture has become in a globalised environment.

Where the book really scores is in going into the social and familial dimension. The commercialisation of agriculture is leading to break-up of joint families, tensions over sharing of roles within families and a challenge to the authority of the family patriarch in decision-making. The clash of social mores, between ‘tradition’ and ‘modernity’, or the old and the young, leads to wounded egos, more so among men; as such, farmers’ suicide becomes as much an assertion of patriarchal honour or injured pride as an act of capitulation (as is normally assumed). To the extent that more men than women seem to take their lives in rural India, this is an important dimension.

The individual who takes it upon himself to invest in a borewell, often against the will of his father, may end up losing face. He makes more investments to salvage his reputation, and goes down a slippery slope.

The shift to citrus is also a marker of “social and cultural mobility”. The book details how “peasants across classes actively follow class (emphasis in the book) consumption practices, as distinct from the coarse, mass style... The binary of class-mass styles organises all sectors of consumption, from consuming high status white rice in lieu of dry millet, to wearing trouser-shirt in place of lungi-shirt...possessing trendy bikes, mobile phones and colour TVs...” In other words, “the consumption of such...goods on the part of the BC, SC and lower-class peasants, especially the new borewell owners among them, is oriented to bridge the conventional differences of honorific taste between them and the elite Reddys.” Along with this, is a “conscious social preference to stay in nuclear families... associated with the entrenchment of egoism in intra-family kin relationships.”

A strange cocktail of masculinity, generally defined through traditional cultural signifiers, and consumerism has driven huge cracks into family ties, social equations and friendships. Notions of ‘maryada’ and ‘manam’ acquire new connotations in a consumerist context.

The contradiction between “the crisis of materialistic production on the one hand and the commitment for upward social and cultural mobility on the other” makes for a unstable environment.

The book also warns that official statistics on farm suicides cannot be taken at face value. In his field study, the author draws a distinction between suicides for entirely farming-related reasons and those where the immediate provocation can be traced to social prestige. In the latter cases, indebtedness is tied up with household consumption rather than expenditure on borewells. The official data, almost by design, glosses over this distinction, as the communities concerned conceal the facts if they happen to be embarrassing. With farmers’ suicides becoming a politically sensitive subject, accompanied by money being doled out, there is incentive to distort the facts.

The book, however, doesn’t discount the magnitude of the crisis. It brings alive rural society in a way that simplistic mainstream media discussions on rural India generally never do.

Farm suicides seem to occur at the intersection of three forces: commodified farming, masculinity in society and rising consumerism. The conflict between the ‘rural’ and the ‘urban’ is almost a stylised fact. It has been dramatically portrayed in novels such as The Good Earth , among many others. In today’s India, the contours of the conflict are changing in a dynamic market economy. An intellectual and political investment in social reforms and women’s literacy could make a difference.