Author and activist Arundhati Roy [ Images ] led an anti-government protest in New Delhi [ Images ] on March 6, on behalf of hundreds of wives of Kerala [ Images ] farmers.

The Booker Prize winner has been espousing the cause of women whose farmer husbands have committed suicide in despair over failed crops. The women are seeking government assistance in having their loans written off.

South India: The world's suicide capital

Thousands of farmers have committed suicide in Kerala's Wyanad district alone following crop failures and subsequent mounting debts since approximately 2001. There have been casualties in other parts of the country too.

A delegation from the All-India Widows and Destitute Women's Movement met Union Minister for Agriculture Sharad Pawar [ Images ] on March 4 in New Delhi, who promised to have a team from the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development look into their problems.

Photograph: Getty Images/ Manpreet Romana