Thesis and Antithesis of Cooperatives in Maharashtra: A Dialectical Perspective | Md Sahidul Islam and Rahul Thombare

Introduction

The state of Maharashtra continues to witness the persistent agrarian distress and challenges in India. One of the grave agrarian crises is the farmers’ suicides. The state accounts for approximately 38% of all farm-sector suicides, the largest share of farmer suicide, in India. (Mohan, 2025). Historically, the state has witnessed persistent farmer suicides between 2015 and 2024; over 37,000 farmer suicides happened in Maharashtra, which exceeds over 3500 per year. This reflects a very grim structural crisis rather than episodic within the state’s agricultural economy. More importantly, we should not forget that the incidence of farmer suicides goes beyond the numerical figures; each suicide reflects the burden borne by households. These agricultural households are stuck in a vicious cycle of poverty, further exacerbating their indebtedness, income insecurity, and vulnerability.

The irony is that this persistent distress exists in a state where one of the largest cooperative societies in India persists. The state of Maharashtra caters to over 2.28 lakh cooperative societies, including credit societies, sugar cooperatives, dairy unions, and marketing societies (Government of India, 2025). In fact, this largest cooperative network was viewed as the backbone of the model of cooperative-led rural development in the state.

However, the coexistence of cooperative density and agrarian crisis reflects a critical question: Why does severe agrarian distress coexist with dense cooperative presence in the state? We explore some aspects to answer through a dialectical thesis