Present a plan of action on farmers’ suicide in 4 weeks: SC to Centre

Satya Prakash

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 27

Terming farmers’ suicide a “serious issue”, the Supreme Court on Monday asked the Centre to prepare a comprehensive plan of action to be followed by states to prevent it.

A Bench headed by Chief Justice of India JS Khehar asked the Centre to file the proposed line of action in four weeks’ time and before the next date of hearing “under all circumstances".

Expressing grave concern over farmer suicides, the top court had earlier said that it felt the government was going in a “wrong direction” in tackling the real problem.

On Monday, it said the government should come out with a policy, which can deal with the root causes of farmers’ suicide.

On behalf of the Centre, Additional Solicitor General P S Narasimha said agriculture fell under the State List of the Constitution and primarily it was for states to deal with it. He, however, said the Centre was taking all possible steps such as procuring food grains directly from farmers, increasing insurance cover, granting loans and crop loss compensation to help farmers in distress.

“Agriculture is a state subject and the Centre will coordinate with states and come up with a line of action to address root cause of farmers committing suicide,” the Bench said.

The direction came after senior counsel Colin Gonsalves submitted on behalf of petitioner — Citizens Resource and Action and Initiative — that over 3,000 farmers had committed suicide and the government should address real issues under a proper policy.

The petitioner had filed the plea only with regard to plight of farmers in Gujarat but the bench had expanded the scope of the petition to include all states. 

The Bench was informed that the situation was much worse in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Narasimha assured the Bench that the government would consult the petitioner in preparing the plan of action as it wasn’t an adversarial litigation.

The ASG had earlier told the Bench that the government was running many schemes for farmers and the 2015 crop insurance scheme would drastically reduce such fateful incidents. Other schemes also needed to be strengthened to make farmers feel that the government would stand behind them in distress, he had said.