Yavatmal cotton farmers' death toll due to pesticide poisoning rises to 21; two critical

Yavatmal: The death toll due to alleged pesticide poisoning in Yavatmal district has risen to 21 after two more farm labourers of Zari tehsil died in GMC hospital on Friday night, hospital officials said.

The names of the deceased have been given as Gajanan Hanmantu Naitam (40), a resident of village Matharjun and Madhukar Kochiram Bawane (33) a resident of village Digras, they said.

At present, there are 21 patients admitted in the GMC of which six are in ICU. Two of them are on the ventilator and their condition is critical, Sandeep Patil, on-duty doctor GMC hospital’s ICU said.

Yavatmal Police in Maharashtra on Friday had registered a case against another retailer for selling pesticides without a license.

A FIR was registered against the owner of Vaibhav Krishi Kendra shop at Wadki in Ralegaon on Friday, police said.

The owner didn’t have the necessary license to sell the pesticides, police said.

The case was registered under the Pesticides Act, 1974, on the complaint of the tehsil agriculture officer. With this, the number of cases registered for unauthorised sale of pesticides has reached nine.

Meanwhile, five more farmers/farm workers suffering from pesticide poisoning have been admitted to the Government Medical College Hospital in Yavatmal, taking the number of such patients to 26.

According to the district officials, compensation of Rs 2 lakh each has been paid to the families of 15 deceased farmers. The rest would get the compensation after autopsy reports are received and the causes of death in those cases are ascertained.

With a sudden spurt in the number of deaths due to pesticide poisoning in the Vidarbha region, the Maharashtra government had ordered a high-level inquiry earlier this month.

According to the inquiry report, wrong mixing of pesticides and lack of protective gear such as hand-gloves and masks while spraying are the main reasons for pesticide poisoning.