Shiva Prasad wants to go to school. At 14, that is where he should be. That is where he was, in Class VII, preparing for his annual examination like millions of children at this time of the year. But ten days back, a second successive year of drought pushed his father over the edge. Rama Rao, a farmer in Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, couldn't face his debtors or family; he had run into a Rs 2 lakh debt to grow chillies and cotton on the four-acre piece of land on lease. Rama Rao lost hope and drank down a bottle of pesticide after inspecting the crop and realising it could not bail him out.
