November 1, 2021
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Journalist Jaideep Hardikar illustrates our agrarian breakdown through the life of a cotton grower in his book ‘Ramrao: The Story of India's Farm Crisis’

Book on agrarian crisis by Jaideep Hardier.A FARMER ends his life every 30 minutes in India. There are some who don’t end up in this pile of statistics and are saved through timely action of family and friends. Ramrao Panchleniwar, a cotton grower in Maharashtra’s Vidarbha region, is one such survivor. He wished to drown his financial worries in two bottles of insecticide in 2014. In this book titled after him, Ramro’s life and near death experience is the central point around which journalist Jaideep Hardikar illustrates India’s unending farm crisis.

Hardikar uses his two-decade experience of reporting on rural affairs to connect the everyday life of Ramrao to policy decisions, workings of market economy and climate crisis.  “Every year, an insidious new factor is added to the list of old reasons compounding the problem of the peasantry,” he puts succinctly. Liberalisation, loan waivers, unchecked sale of spurious agro chemicals, demonetisation, pest attacks, all leave a mark on Ramrao who is also battling personal losses. The suicide bid leaves him broken until inspiration is found in a new tragedy. Though there is no hope of being debt free, he is determined to give a good fight.

Not every day is gloomy. Ramrao finds joy in simple things; blooming marigolds, religious tales, and playing with grandchildren bring him peace as does helping those less privileged than him. He also revels in dark humour, unburdening himself with jokes on death and poverty. That Hardikar has access to this farmer’s heart is also a lesson for other field writers on how to drop the distance, how to be objective and yet see the other as our own whom one can support in dire times and join in celebration of small victories.

That Hardikar has access to this farmer’s heart is also a lesson for other field writers on how to drop the distance, how to be objective and yet see the other as our own whom one can support in dire times and join in celebration of small victories 

This collaboration is what uplifts the book, saving it from going the path of trite TV debates and academic writings on what ails the Indian agriculture. Whether it’s the ever increasing cost of private health care, scarcity of formal loan source, rural-urban divide or rising input costs impinging on profits, the reader understands all these issues through Ramrao.

The book also talks about farm widows, the determined women who take up multiple labour jobs to support families ignoring their own needs, wondering if they are even eligible to think about themselves. This societal marginalisation of women is complemented by lack of institutional support for them because even though 77 percent women rely on agriculture as their primary income, just about 12 percent have land holdings in their names.

Hardikar does not leave out marginal farmers or landless farm hands who lose roofs above their heads during every harsh monsoon or die by inhaling toxic fumes of dangerous agro chemicals which are sold without any oversight by authorities. The most moving accounts are of the children of farmers who ended their lives unable to bear the unequal world and helplessness of their parents. These teenagers found it better to remove themselves unless the burden of one more life pushes the family further into penury.

The writer does not leave out marginal farmers or landless farm hands who lose roofs above their heads during every harsh monsoon or die by inhaling toxic fumes of dangerous agro chemicals which are sold without any oversight by authorities

The book comes at a time when farmers are struggling to be heard despite sitting on borders of the national capital for almost a year. It sets the record straight on why Indian farmers, just like those in developed countries, deserve assured prices and procurement.

The NSSO survey 2018-19 confirms that an average farming family earns more by working as a labourer elsewhere than by cultivating crops in its own fields. The average income still remains a measly Rs 10,000 a month.

Price: Rs 399, Pages: 265, Publisher: HarperCollins

This writeup was first published in The Tribune