MARATHWADA, India — On a small plot of parched land in Maharashtra, Mirabai Khindkar’s life has been shattered. After successive crop failures, brought on by relentless drought and scorching heat, her husband Amol took his own life last year, weighed down by debt he could never repay.
“When he was in hospital, I prayed to all the gods to save him,” Mirabai said, her voice trembling. “But he died a week later. We talked last about the loans, how we would pay.”
Their story is far from unique. Across Marathwada, a once fertile region home to 18 million people, farmers are increasingly trapped in a deadly cycle of poor harvests, rising debts, and despair. In recent years, the intensifying effects of climate change have worsened an already fragile farming landscape.
Last year alone, extreme weather affected 3.2 million hectares of cropland across India an area larger than Belgium with over 60 per cent of this damage concentrated in Maharashtra, according to research by the Centre for Science and Environment in New Delhi.
“Summers are extreme,” said Amol’s brother, Balaji Khindkar, himself a farmer. “Even when we do everything right, the yields are not enough. There’s not enough water, and the rains have become unreliable.”
The consequences are stark. Between 2022 and 2024, 3,090 farmers in Marathwada took their own lives an average of nearly three deaths each day, according to India’s Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
While official data does not specify the precise causes behind these suicides, experts point to the crushing pressure of dwindling incomes, growing debts, and the unpredictability of farming in a changing climate.
“Indian farmer suicides reflect a deeper crisis in agriculture one of falling incomes, poor investment, and fragile productivity,” explained R. Ramakumar, a professor of development studies at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences. “Climate change increases the risks it brings more crop failures and uncertainty, making farming a dangerous gamble for smallholders.”
For many farmers, borrowing money is the only way to stay afloat. But banks are wary of lending to farmers exposed to such risks, driving some towards loan sharks who charge crippling interest.
Mirabai’s late husband owed more than $8,000 many times their annual income. She now works as a farm labourer but struggles to repay the debt.
“Nothing comes out of the farm,” she said bitterly. “I want my children to find jobs outside farming.”
The agricultural crisis is not limited to Maharashtra. Across India, farming suicide rates remain alarmingly high. In 2022, more than 30 farmers died by suicide each day nationwide, according to the National Crime Records Bureau.
At another farm nearby, 32-year-old Shaikh Imran is already $1,100 in debt after his soybean crop failed. “Where do we get water to irrigate the fields?” asked his mother, Khatijabi. “There’s none for drinking, let alone farming.”
Experts urge the government to step up support with better crop insurance and investments in farming research to reduce farmers’ exposure to climate risks.
“Agriculture should not be a gamble on the monsoon,” Ramakumar said.
As the climate crisis deepens, the fate of millions of Indian farmers hangs in the balance their livelihoods and lives increasingly imperilled by a warming world.
