Lalitpur: Maya's late husband Govind watched the cloudless skies for months, silently praying for rains. Hope faded each day. He drank poison on Tuesday.
"He told me that this season there would be no crop and there is so much debt to repay,'' says Maya.
Govind village is in Lalitpur district of Bundelkhand. The district has received barely 40 per cent of its average annual rainfall. Drought has been declared in the five adjoining districts. But not Lalitpur, allegedly because the BSP is wary of the Congress' political progress.
Says R S Debolia, a Congress leader: ''The Congress candidate won in this district. That's why Mayawati is refusing to declare this district as drought-hit.''
Govind's death has shaken up the village and come as a cruel reminder of the previous drought in Bundelkhand, which last 4 years and claimed nearly 700 farmers' lives. The Centre had promised Rs 4,000 crore relief package -- but the farmers here are still waiting to see that money. The state relief provided was so little that it has become a local joke here.
For 4 acres, Ram Pratap Chaubey got 190 rupees. It was easier for him to keep the cheque as a memento. ''To claim the cheque, I went to Mehrauni four times. The fifth time, they told me the cheque was outdated,'' Chaubey said.
This time, it's no different.
Fifty eight of Uttar Pradesh's 70 districts are drought-hit.
But relief will come only after assessments of damage for each farmer is done.
Farmers say it's not as easy for them to get relief as it is for Mayawati to get crores sanctioned for memorials of Dalit leaders.
So in Govind's memory, this is all that is left: A family of five, directionless and starving. And a farm full of not crop but poisonous grass.