Farmers Movement Archive

Pressure rises on farmers to move out

After two months of protests without any significant pushback, the farmers’ agitation on the borders of Delhi is now seeing concerted pressure and intimidation from the police, as well as local villagers and administrations, to force them to vacate multiple dharna locations. Putting farm unions further on the backfoot in the wake of Republic Day violence, show-cause notices have been issued to union leaders, six of whom have been summoned to join the probe at the Delhi Police Special Cell office on Friday. Thousands of farmers were engaged in a stand-off with the Uttar Pradesh police on the Ghazipur border with Delhi on Thursday after the Ghaziabad administration issued an ultimatum that if the protesters do not leave by midnight, they will be removed forcibly. An emotional Rakesh Tikait, leader of one faction of the Bharatiya Kisan Union, declared that “if the black laws were not taken back and he was forcibly removed from the site, he would end his life.” Electricity and water supply to the protest site were cut earlier in the day, and local residents have been demanding that they clear the road as well. The two largest protest sites, at Tikri and Singhu on the Haryana border, saw an increased deployment of security forces through the day. A group of people, claiming to be residents of nearby villages, staged a demonstration against the agitation at Singhu, demanding that the inter-State highway be cleared. “It appears that the government is trying to attack from all sides,” said Kavitha Kuruganti, a leader of the Mahila Kisan Adhikaar Manch, who is at the Singhu border. “Supplies and facilities being squeezed in different locations, communication being curtailed severely and setting up local people to protest, apart from getting eviction orders and attempting the same.” SKM leaders undertook a Sadbhavana or Goodwill Yatra for 16 km from the Singhu border on the road towards Sonepat, flying the tricolour and using loudspeakers to broadcast the message that “patriotism and nationalism are not the sole claims of only some people, and that it is from farmer households that India’s jawans also emerge and guard the nation, and that farmers are equally patriotic if not more.” (With inputs from Anuj Kumar, Shinjini Ghosh, Ashok Kumar and Priscilla Jebaraj and Saurabh Trivedi)

The Hindu

2021-01-29

NEW DELHI