Another farmer ends life in Burdwan

With another farmer-suicide on New Years-Eve, the beginning seems not so happy for Burdwan at least. The body of Amiya Saha (45), a Memari-based farmer who allegedly committed suicide was found in his field on Sunday morning. As per Saha’s family, being totally burdened by crop loss and mounting debts, Amiya had no other option left.

This is not the first case either. Just in a gap of two months this is the fifth suicide case in Burdwan – the rice-bowl of Bengal. Earlier, in November last week Safar Ali Mollah, another potato farmer committed suicide in the same way at Bhatar followed by another suicidal case of Bhabani Porel (45), of Burdwan Sadar Police Station area just three days back. Another farmer Barun Paul (42) of the same Bhatar area had also followed the same path on December 20th. Manab Ghose of Raina had also committed suicide.

Though, the district administration is yet to acknowledge the allegations of crop loss and mounting debts of the said families. Talking to media, the SDO (south) Mrinal Kanti Rana said, “As per the primary investigation it has came to our knowledge that Mr. Saha was suffering for some severe diseases of kidney and heart for a long time. And, the suicide is nothing but a clear case of his utter frustration. It had nothing to do with either food loss or the market-debt.”

The local TMC-MLA Abu Hasem Mandol also echoed the same view– “If he was really facing any trouble to sell his harvested crops at the Minimum Support Price (MSP) predetermined by the state  government, he should have lodged his complain. But surprisingly we have never found such documents. Moreover, we have got to know that he had already been able to sell his harvested potato at the local markets.” The Burdwan district magistrate Onkar Singh Meena also confirmed that, due to the huge expenses of his treatment at Bengaluru, the Saha family was going through a fund crisis and the  victim could not confront the reality and ended his life.