Daily wage earners, housewives comprised 40% of suicide victims in 2018, shows NCRB data; fewer farmers ended lives as compared to 2016

Daily wage earners and housewives comprised nearly 40 percent of suicide victims in 2018, data released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) on Wednesday showed. Of the 1,34,516 suicide victims in 2018,  26,589 were daily wagers (22.4 percent) and 22,937 were housewives (17.1 percent), data from the NCRB, the agency responsible for collecting and analysing crime data, revealed. [caption id=“attachment_3902855” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. AFP[/caption] The total number of suicides in 2018 saw a 3.6 percent rise from 2017, when 1,29,887 people ended their lives, as per the report entitled 2018 Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India. Of the total suicide victims, 88,986 (66 percent) had an annual income of less than Rs 1 lakh. Those earning between Rs 1 lakh and 5 lakh accounted for 39,080 (29.1 percent) of the total suicide victims. ‘Family problems’ and ‘illness’, with 30.4 percent and 17.7 percent, respectively, were the two major causes of suicide. These were followed by ‘other causes’ (12.7 percent), ‘causes not known’ (11 percent), ‘marriage related issues’ (6.2 percent) and drug abuse and alcohol addiction (5.3 percent). Fewer farmer suicides In the farm sector 10,349 people ended their lives in 2018 — a vast majority of them men — accounting for 7.7 percent of the total number of suicides in the country. The report shows that fewer farmers committed suicide in 2018 compared to 2016, when 11,379 farmers committed suicide. The NCRB did not release the 2017 data on farmers in its report. Many states and union territories have reported nil data on suicides by farmers, cultivators and farm labourers. “West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Uttarakhand, Meghalaya, Goa, Chandigarh, Daman and Diu, Delhi, Lakshadweep and Puducherry reported zero suicides of farmers/cultivators as well as agricultural labourers,” the NCRB report said. “A total of 10,349 persons involved in farming sector (consisting of 5,763 farmers/cultivators and 4,586 agricultural labourers) have committed suicides during 2018, accounting for 7.7 percent of total suicides in the country,” the report said. “Out of 5,763 farmer/cultivator suicides, a total of 5,457 were male and 306 were female during 2018. Out of 4,586 suicides committed by agricultural labourers during 2018, 4,071 were male and 515 were female,” it said. Most suicides in Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu A majority of suicides were reported in Maharashtra (17,972) followed by Tamil Nadu (13,896), West Bengal (13,255), Madhya Pradesh (11,775) and Karnataka (11,561), accounting for 13.4, 10.3, 9.9, 8.8 and 8.6 percent, respectively, it said. “These five states together accounted for 50.9 percent of the total suicides reported in the country. The remaining 49.1 percent suicides were reported in the remaining 24 states and 7 UTs,” the report added. Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state with 16.9 percent share of the country’s population, has reported comparatively lower percentage share of suicide deaths, accounting for only 3.6 percent of the total suicides in the country in 2018. Delhi, which is the most-populous UT, has reported the highest number of suicides (2,526) among UTs, followed by Puducherry (500). With inputs from PTI