Lethal dose: Farmers dying, still no ban on toxic pesticides in Maharashtra

Pesticides can cause immediate health effects in people who are preparing, mixing or using them

Rekha Madavi, 45, did not know the name of the pesticide her husband, Rushi, 55, had been spraying on their cotton crop. All their pesticide containers had been seized by the police for examination.

“It is the same ‘mono’ aushadh (insecticide/medicine) that all of us in the village spray on cotton,” said Srikrishna Gedam, Madavi’s neighbour in Chak Mankapur, an adivasi village in eastern Maharashtra’s Chandrapur district.

On August 26, 2018, Rushi Madavi had left home to spray pesticide on the family’s 5-acre cotton farm in Pendhari village, 2 km from his home. When he returned home around