Loss of optimism in farmers pushes them to suicide: Experts

The suicide committed by a grieved farmer from Rajasthan in the midst of an AAP rally here on Wednesday not only points to his traumatic mental state after untimely rains destroyed his crops but also highlights his "loss of optimism" and "hopelessness", say experts.

Minutes before Delhi's Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal was to address thousands of farmers at a rally against the government's controversial land ordinance, which is being projected by opposition parties as anti-farmer, the death of Gajendra Singh came as testimony to the plight of many farmers.

"The farmers are at the downward spiral of well-being and in today's age of inequality they don't see things getting better for them," Sanjeev Jain, clinical psychologist at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), told IANS.

"This loss of optimism is a big factor that precipitates suicidal ideas. They are convinced that nothing will change and such depressing thoughts lead them to take such extreme steps," he added.

According to the information provided by the ministry of agriculture in November 2014, incidents of suicide by farmers due to agrarian distress during the year 2014 have been mainly reported by the state governments of Maharashtra (204 up to April 2014), Telangana (69 up to October 2014), Karnataka (19 in 2014-15 so far), Gujarat (3 up to October 2014), Kerala (3 up to October 2014) and Andhra Pradesh (3 up to June 2014).

The experts also said that there are multiple reasons that push an individual to end his/her life and these could vary from sheer depression to psycho-social reasons.

There is a thin line between hope and hopelessness that amplifies their suicidal tendencies.

"When one is going through rough patch, if a person is hopeful he believes everything will be alright and there is more to life than this depressing phase. But when a person feels there is no hope and reaches a point where he is gloomy and even ashamed of himself, he kills himself," Pulkit Sharma, clinical psychologist at Imago Centre for Self, told IANS.

Sharma added that in suicide cases "duration of sadness is not important but intensity is".