http://www.telegraphindia.com/1120217/jsp/bengal/story_15145977.jsp

Crop woes drive farmer to suicide

OUR CORRESPONDENT

Burdwan, Feb. 16: A debt-ridden sharecropper committed suicide in a Burdwan village after his potato crop and vegetables were destroyed by blight and worms. Madhab Santra, 41, a resident Bajenaohati village in Memari, walked out of his house last evening and drank pesticide. "When he returned around 7.30pm, he could hardly walk," said Raghab Santra, Madhab's cousin. Neighbours rushed in after Madhab's wife, two daughters and son raised the alarm. He was taken to the rural hospital 8km away where he died around midnight. Madhab is the ninth farmer to have committed suicide in Burdwan since November. Raghab said Madhab was forced to sell the two-and-a-half quintals of paddy he had cultivated last year to middlemen at Rs 600 per quintal, much below the minimum support price of Rs 1,080. "But a bigger blow came when most of the potato crop he cultivated after that was destroyed by blight. To add to his misfortune, the tomatoes and cucumbers he cultivated next were destroyed by worms. Madhab had a debt of Rs 50,000 accumulated over three years," Raghab said. Another cousin of Madhav, Jadav, said: "He had also taken a loan of Rs 25,000 from a cooperative society to buy fertilisers and pesticides."