Reddy Cotton deaths rerun

Hyderabad, Feb. 7: Six daughters of a turmeric farmer, who died of a heart attack following four failed crops, tied a sari around their necks and walked into the sea together in a suicide pact before their father?s pyre was lit.

Four bodies of the girls, who were aged between 15 and 22, have been washed ashore. A search is on for the other two, police said.

Their mother, 42-year-old Durga, was also part of the suicide pact in a coastal village in Visakhapatnam district, but she survived and is now in hospital.

?I don?t know why they loosened my end (of the sari) and before my eyes, they were swept away by waves,? she wailed from her hospital bed in Tuni, a town 50 km from the village.

The mother and daughters had waited till 51-year-old P. Appa Rao?s last rites were completed before heading to the sea, bound together by the sari. They wanted to kill themselves before he was consigned to the flames.

Villagers in Pentakota, about 100 km from Visakhapatnam, said the family was desperate as crop after crop had failed and their debts had mounted to about Rs 20 lakh. They also believed that they were victims of ?black magic? and would not be able to come out of the rut. When Rao died suddenly, they could not cope.

?All the women tied themselves together with a sari in their suicide attempt,? police in Tuni said.

One of the farmer?s three sons, 16-year-old Murali, also attempted suicide by lying down on train tracks but was saved by a passer-by. Murali has taken the engineering entrance exams and was afraid he would not be able to pursue the course. The other sons are aged about 12 and 18.

Not long ago, Rao was among the rich turmeric farmers of the district ? the crop is grown widely in this fertile west Godavari belt ? with 15 acres under cultivation. He would produce nearly a quintal of turmeric per acre.

?However, consecutive failure of turmeric crops for four seasons? pushed him under debt, police said. He owed Rs 7 lakh to the co-operative society alone.

Turmeric crop failure is not widespread, unlike that of cotton and groundnut crops that drove an alarming number of farmers to death. The first decision of the Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy government was to announce free power for farmers and waive their power dues of Rs 1,200 crore. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh?s first visit outside Delhi was to Andhra Pradesh, where he met suicide-hit families and promised relief.

Visakhapatnam district collector, Sanjay Kumar Jain, said he tried to visit the village to meet the family?s surviving members. Apart from Durga, her three sons are alive.