Families of 82 farmers who had committed suicide or died due to various other reasons have been given a sum of ₹3 lakh each from the Chief Minister’s Public Relief Fund during 2016-17.
Among them, 30 farmers had committed suicide apparently owing to crop failure in the wake of drought, sources in the Agriculture Department told The Hindu on Saturday.
Clarifying on a recent communication to Puliyur A. Nagarajan, president, farmers’ wing of the Tamil Maanila Congress, from the State Director of Agriculture, sources said that the reply sent in response to a petition had inadvertently put the number of farmers who had committed suicide in the State at 82. The number included farmers “who had died due to various reasons,” apart from those who committed suicide. This was inadvertently omitted in the reply, they said.
The communication, released to the media here by Mr. Nagarajan on Saturday, was in reply to his petition to the Chief Minister’s Cell seeking compensation for farmers who had committed suicide or died of shock due to crop failure in the wake of the severe drought in the State.
Initially, families of 17 farmers who committed suicide were sanctioned the compensation as announced by the State government in January. Subsequently, another government order was issued sanctioning the compensation to families of 65 farmers, 13 of whom had committed suicide, the sources said.
Mr. Nagarajan, in his petition, had claimed that over 275 farmers had committed suicide or died of shock and demanded compensation for their families. He had also sought a hike in compensation to the families of the dead farmers to ₹30 lakh each.
Input subsidy
The communication from Director of Agriculture V. Dakshinamurthy, dated March 27, also pointed out that the State government had sanctioned ₹2,247.07 crore from the State Disaster Response Fund to be given as input subsidy to drought-affected farmers. Of this, about ₹2,049 crore sanction has been given for disbursement of input subsidy to about 28.99 lakh farmers whose crops had suffered more than 33% damage. Crops on an estimated 18.73 lakh hectares have sustained damage due to drought, the communication said, adding that the government was implementing various schemes to protect the livelihood of farmers.
Mr. Nagarajan reiterated his demand for sanction of compensation to the families of all farmers who had committed suicide or died of shock owing to crop failure. He also demanded a hike in the compensation amount.
