Church commits Rs 3 million to Vidarbha farmers

The failure of crops and the suicide of farmers in Vidharbha region led local Christians in Mumbai and dioceses of the Vidharbha region to donate over Rs three million to the affected farmers and families.

Urging Christians to contribute to the distressed farmers Archbishop of Bombay Oswald Gracias in an official message said, “When a tragedy strikes and we see our brothers and sisters in pain, in a spirit of Christian solidarity, we spontaneously go forward to ease their suffering. When the failure of crops in successive years recently caused the farmers of Vidarbha to commit suicide in thousands we just could not be insensitive to this issue.”

“The priests, religious and the lay faithful of the Archdiocese of Bombay came forward generously with their contributions to alleviate the sufferings of those farmers and their families,” noted the Archbishop.

A donation of Rs 30, 22, 834/– was collected and handed over to Caritas India, which on behalf of the Archdiocese of Bombay, together with the affected diocese of the Vidharbha region i.e. Nagpur, Amravati and Chanda, initiated some urgent and short term interventions in eight districts covering 27 villages which were badly affected.

ICNS quoted the action plan undertaken by Caritas India as, "Identifying the suicide victims’ families and counseling them, helping the victims families to get Government compensation, starting Self Help Groups of men, women and youth, providing educational support to the children of suicide victim families and promoting off–farm income generation programmes to generate additional income, promoting watershed programme, promotion of organic farming and other land development activities etc."

According to official figures, 3705 farmers in Vidharbha region (comprising of 11 districts) have committed suicides due to debts and crop failure since Jan 1, 2001.

Year 2007 saw 980 farmers end their lives till October 30, 2007, which brings the average suicide rate to 98 per month, it said.