Take care of children, You won't see me again : Farmer's last words

On June 6, Beeraiah, a farmer in Telangana's Medak district, made a strange phone call to his village headman after dinner. "Please take care of my children - you will not see me again," he said before hanging up. The headman rushed to his farm to find the 28-year-old hanging from a tree near his house.

Beeraiah's story is similar to that of 100 other debt-ridden farmers who have killed themselves in the last two months in India's newest state, which has suffered the poorest monsoon in the country. The government is staring at the grim statistic at a time Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called for using resources and research to help farmers produce more.

For the past few days, heavy rain has filled up tanks in Telangana but for most farmers, it is too late to plant new crop. They have no money to do so.

"I don't see too many chances of recovery," says Lakshman Singh Rathore, director general of the Indian Meteorological Department, talking about deficient rain in the Kharif season crucial to most farmers in this region. In Thimmakapally village, Beeraiah's family members still can't believe that a confident and resourceful man, who always advised others not to lose hope, could just give up.

"I thought my son would look after me in old age. Now I have to keep myself alive so his children don't starve," says his 65-year-old father Singaiah. Beeraiah's 24-year-old wife has two young children to think of - Jaswant, 7, and Devender, 5. "Even with a good crop, we would just have enough to survive. We were never able to repay loans," Manjula told NDTV. Now she has to find a way of surviving with her family.

Critics say the government has failed to help the farmers, the state's new government squarely blames decades of neglect by authorities from Seemandhra, or the leftover region after the division of Andhra Pradesh on June 2 for the creation of Telangana.

"I will only blame the political system, the Seemandhra leaders and their mindset. They never tried to give water to Telangana farmers," says State Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao. Beyond politics, the state government appears to have no plan to help the farmers. The Centre says it can do nothing unless the state declares drought and seeks help. It is waiting for a word from Chief Minister K Chandrasekhara Rao.

101 farmers kill themselves in 2 months

In the last two months, since the creation of Telangana, 101 farmers have killed themselves in India's newest state, according to statistics compiled from police records.

Telangana has reported the worst monsoon deficit in the country this kharif season. "I don't see too many chances of a recovery," says Lakshman Singh Rathore, director general of the Indian Meteorological department, while talking about the grim situation in the state.

The inadequate monsoon has driven many farmers to the edge of despair. One of them is Beeraiah, a 28-year-old farmer from Thimmakapally village in Medak district. His family members still can't believe it. Beeraiah, they say, was confident and resourceful. How could someone -- who often urged others not to lose hope -- just give up, they ask in disbelief.

"I thought my son would look after me in old age. Now I have to keep myself alive so his children don't starve," says his 65-year-old father Singaiah. "Even with a good crop, we would just have enough to survive. We were never able to repay loans. But what else could we do,'' says Beeraiah's 24-year-old wife Manjula. She now has to find a way to take care of her two sons -- 7-year-old Jaswant and 5-year-old Devender. Many farmers who have taken the extreme step in Telangana are young men like Beeraiah.

They are hard workers and they are resourceful, but they fail to find any hope in agriculture and they have nowhere else to go. This is the story we found in village after village, district after district, in Telangana. While critics say the government has failed to help the farmers, the Telangana government squarely blames decades of neglect by authorities from Seemandhra region.

"I will only blame the political system, the Seemandhra leaders and their mindset. They never tried to give water to Telangana farmers," says State Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao. Most farmers here are now in no position to plant a new crop even if the region receives some rainfall later in the season. They have no money to do so.