Cotton farmers in Warangal sowing seeds
Domestic production of cotton in India this year may be at an all-time high of over 40 million bales. However, farmers who grow the crop in Telangana are in deep distress due to high input costs and low remunerative prices. In Warangal district, for instance, where 50 per cent of cultivated area grows cotton, erratic rainfall has reduced output with farmers not getting even the Minimum Support Price (MSP).
In Sayampet village, Mallikarjun, a 35-year-old farmer committed suicide by drinking pesticide.
"Last three years, cotton crop failed and yet we grew cotton because only that gives hope that we can repay debts, if it is a good crop and we get a good price. Both did not happen,'' said Padma, Mallikarjun's wife.
This year, cotton seeds, already expensive because everyone has shifted to Bt cotton, had to be sown repeatedly because of erratic rainfall which multiplied costs.
Advocates of the Bt cotton crop take credit for India becoming one of the highest producers of cotton in the world. However, statistics also show that it is cotton farmers among who the maximum number of suicide deaths have been reported.
Jagapath Reddy, a cotton farmer, explains that there is a luck factor involved.
"If there are two rains, we get 15 quintals. If there is hardly one wetting, we won't even get two quintals. Hardly anyone has assured irrigation for their cotton crop," he said.
G Ramanjaneyulu, director, Centre for Sustainable Agriculture, explains that the worrying shift of large areas to cotton, at the cost of dry crops and pulses, is something the government has to stop pro-actively.
"Wherever little crop could be saved in cotton, this year the price also is not there. MSP announced was already lower at Rs 4050. Even that is not being ensured," he said.
Even though the state government had recommended Rs 7000 as MSP, the Centre fixed it at Rs 4050.