Lockdown: Unable to sell cucumber farmer commits suicide

Representative image.

A 45 years old farmer, a father of five daughters and a son, committed suicide after he suffered loss reportedly due to the extended lockdown during which he was unable to sell cucumbers he had grown on rented land in a village in Ahmedabad.

This is said to be the second case of farmers' suicide in the ongoing lockdown for containing coronavirus pandemic. A day before, an onion grower had ended his life in Bhavnagar.

The latest case was reported at Sola police station in Ahmedabad where a farmer Ganpatbhai H Dantani, a resident of Sola Gam allegedly hanged himself at his house. Police record states that he hanged himself while his family was sleeping sometime on May 13 midnight. He was rushed to Sola civil hospital where he was declared dead. Sola police inspector J P Jadeja confirmed DH that “A case of accidental death (suicide) has been registered.”

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During the investigation, Dantani's wife Saroj told the police that he was into cucumber farming. He had taken lands on rent in the vicinity and used to sell the produce near Satyam Mall. She also said, as mentioned in the police report, that “Due to lockdown, Dantani was unable to sell cucumbers for a very long time while his debt kept increasing.”

She told police that financial loss led her husband to end his life. Dantani left behind his five daughters aged 24, 23, 20, 18, 14 and a 16-year-old son who were all dependent on him.

Meanwhile, an onion grower farmer identified as Bhupat Jethva, 53, a resident of Isora village in Bhavnagar district also committed suicide by hanging himself in a tree in his farm on Thursday. His family members have claimed that Jethva was under stress due to poor price of onions in the wholesale market. However, a police officer claimed that Jethva ended his life due to a family dispute.

With the rising number of coronavirus cases, the state government has extended lockdown across the districts including Bhavnagar which is one of the worst affected for the past 50 days. As on Friday evening, state reported 9,932 positive cases while the death toll stood at 606.