Farmers suicides: Kin to get Rs1 lakh

Congress-NCP opposition party MLAs stage a protest on the farmer suicide issue against the ruling BJP-Shiv Sena government at Vidhan Bhavan during the budget session. (Photo: Rajesh Jadhav)

The state government will pay Rs 1 lakh in compensation, without any condition or enquiry, to each farm family whose breadwinner had committed suicide. The announcement was made by relief and rehabilitation minister, Eknath Khadse, in both houses, during a debate on drought.

“The government will pay Rs 1 lakh without any condition or enquiry to the family of the breadwinner farmer who committed suicide. Also in case of incidents like falling from trees, snake bites or floods, the compensation given will be Rs 4 lakh instead of the current Rs 1.5 lakh,” Mr Khadse said.

Existing protocol requires administration to conduct an enquiry to confirm whether the lone bread earner farmer committed suicide owing to drought or inability to repay loans.

However, Mr Khadse said that the government had done away with enquiries and conditions effective hereon. “It used to take time to enquire, leading to delay in paying compensation. So now, our government has decided to relax the norms and removed all conditions and the enquiry process so as to pay relief as soon as possible,” he said.

Another issue that used to delay payment of compensation to farm families was the viscera report. Each time a farmer committed suicide, his viscera would be sent for testing and only when the reports came, would compensation be paid.

“The reports generally take time, and to speed up the process, we have asked labs to conduct tests in such cases on priority and submit reports in one month At the same time, the government has decided to increase the relief fund by Rs 2.5 lakh, in case of farmers dying due to natural calamities like floods, landslides, electrocution and fires and even incidents like snake bites and falling from trees. As per current norms, the deceased farmers are liable to get Rs 1.5 lakh in case of death due to natural calamity apart from suicide. Now, the family of the deceased will get Rs 4 lakh as compensation,” said Mr Khadse.

Meanwhile, the Opposition in both houses, who discussed the issue over three days last week, demanded the government increase the relief to family of deceased farmer from existing Rs 1 lakh to Rs 2 lakh. Mr Khadse however refused to increase the amount. He also said that the government has delegated powers to district collectors to decide on supply of water tankers or deepening of existing wells.