The government on Monday said many states and Union Territories have not provided details of farmer suicides and hence, the national data on the causes of suicide in the farming sector is "untenable" and cannot be published. Union Minister of State for Home G Kishan Reddy said as informed by the National Crime Records Bureau, many states and UTs have reported "nil" data on suicides by farmers, cultivators and agricultural labourers after several validations, even while reporting suicides in other professions.
"Due to this limitation, national data on the causes of suicide in farming sector was untenable and not published separately," he said in a written reply. According to the latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data on accidental deaths and suicides, 10,281 farmers died by suicide in 2019, down from 10,357 in 2018.
The suicide rate in the farming sector accounted for 7.4 per cent of the total suicides in the country — 5,957 farmers and 4,324 agricultural labourers, the NCRB said in the report containing the latest data.
Recently, the NCRB data revealed that nearly 43,000 people engaged in farming sector and daily wage earners took their lives in 2019. As many as 32,563 daily wage earners ended their lives during the year and formed 23.4 per cent of the total suicide cases in the country, up from 30,132 in 2018, the data showed.
As many as 10,281 people involved in farming sector (consisting of 5,957 farmers or cultivators and 4,324 agricultural labourers) killed themselves in 2019, accounting for 7.4 per cent of total suicide victims (1,39,123) in the country, it stated. The suicide figures for people engaged in farming sector stood at 10,349 (7.7 per cent) of the total in 2018, previous data showed.
Out of 5,957 farmer or cultivator suicides in 2019, a total of 5,563 were male and 394 female. Out of the 4,324 agricultural labourers who died by suicide during 2019, 3,749 were male and 575 were female, the NCRB, which functions under the Union Home Ministry, stated. Majority of victims engaged in farming sector were reported in Maharashtra (38.2 per cent), Karnataka (19.4 per cent), Andhra Pradesh (10 per cent), Madhya Pradesh (5.3 per cent) and Chhattisgarh and Telangana (4.9 per cent each), the data showed. However, the NCRB stated that West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Uttarakhand, Manipur, Chandigarh, Daman & Diu, Delhi UT, Lakshadweep and Puducherry reported zero suicides of farmers or cultivators as well as agricultural labourers.
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