Nation Briefs

Maharashtra: 21 farmer suicides in Yavatmal district in January

Nagpur: The Yavatmal district of eastern Maharashtra recorded 21 farmer suicides in January, an activist said on Wednesday, accusing the government of failing to deal with the agrarian crisis. Kishore Tiwari, former chairman of the state government’s Vasantrao Naik Sheti Swavlamban Mission (VNSSM), shared an official list of the farmers who allegedly died by suicide in the district last month. Western Vidarbha, where cotton and soybean are major crops, has been reporting farmer suicides since 1998, and all the relief packages of the UPA as well as NDA govts failed to address the core issues such as input costs, irrigation, soil health, minimum support price, local storage and processing facilities and government procurement, he said.

Uttarakhand: 5-year-old boy, elderly woman killed in leopard attacks

Rudraprayag/Nainital: A 5-year-old boy and an elderly woman were killed in separate leopard attack incidents in Uttarakhand, police said. In Sindravani village of Rudraprayag district, a leopard snatched a child playing in his courtyard on Tuesday afternoon and dragged him into the forest. Upon receiving the information, teams from the district administration and the forest department reached the spot and launched a search for the child. Rudraprayag Sub-Divisional Magistrate Sohan Singh Saini, who led the search operation, said that seven teams conducted a continuous search, after which the child’s mutilated body was recovered from the forest at 11 pm.