"No Choice": No Money For Oxen, Tractor, Elderly Couple Till Land For Crops

A heartbreaking video of a 75-year-old farmer tilling his land with his elderly wife in Maharashtra's Latur has put the spotlight on how farmers with limited resources are struggling to grow crops. Ambadas Pawar has 2.5 acres of land at Hadolti village in Latur district in Marathwada region. He does not have the resources to get oxen or a tractor to till the land and prepare it for growing crops. Neither can he afford to hire labourers to do the job for him.

Left with no other option, Ambadas Pawar and his wife Muktabai have been tilling this land with a hal -- a wooden plough -- for several years now. Muktabai said their son works as a labourer in the city and the elderly couple does all the agricultural work, from tilling to harvesting, by themselves. The couple's daughter-in-law and two grandchildren stay with them. They also have a daughter, who is married and stays at her in-laws' place.

Ambadas Pawar also lamented that the heavy rain over the past couple of years damaged the crop and pushed him to take loans.

In the video that has now gone viral, the elderly couple look exhausted as they till the land. "I can't stop. My arms tremble, my legs buckle under the weight, and my neck gets tired sometimes, but life hasn't given us a choice," said Ambadas Pawar.

The video has yet again put the focus on the struggle of smaller farmers as agricultural costs rise and an unreliable climate raises risks. The Marathwada region recorded as many as 269 farmer suicides between January and March this year. This is a 30 per cent uptick from the 204 farmer suicides during the same period last year.